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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/24119560">Legacies</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/laniew1/pseuds/laniew1'>laniew1</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Roswell New Mexico (TV 2019)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>F/M, M/M</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-05-10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-10-19</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-02 15:20:33</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>24</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>44,270</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/24119560</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/laniew1/pseuds/laniew1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>There comes a point when a blind eye can no longer be turned.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Michael Guerin/Alex Manes</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>195</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>315</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Roswell New Mexico ▶ Michael Guerin / Alex Manes</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Book 1: Chapter 1</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Posting early, because today is my birthday! And I have tomorrow off from the job I'm still working at from home and will not be up at my usual time to post.</p><p>I'm super excited and super nervous to be posting this. Though I should also say Jesse Manes is his own warning?</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <b>Legacies 1/?</b><br/>
</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>It gets called in as a disturbance, Jim lets it go to the end of his day because he knows that Jesse and Alex have been having some loud fights. He can’t even count the number of calls he’s gotten in recent weeks from ‘concerned’ neighbors so he doesn’t put much stock in it being anything other Alex being a teenager and Jesse being Jesse.</p><p>He gets no response when he knocks on the front door, everything is quiet.</p><p>Really quiet. Too quiet.</p><p>He’s listened to Jesse complain way too many times over way too many beers about how Alex has taken to hiding in the tool-shed.</p><p>He knows how to get through the fence and nothing trips any alarm bells until he notices that the door to the shed is not shut all the way.</p><p>And then he notices the blood <i>on</i> the door. He eases it open with his boot, doesn’t touch anything because his gut is doing the rolling clenching thing where he just <i>knows</i> he’s going to see something on the other side of the door that he’s not going to be able to explain away and is going to mean slapping handcuffs on the man he’s considered his best friend since they were kids.</p><p>There’s a body lying there, blood all over.</p><p>“Jesus Christ,” he breathes and he fumbles for his radio, that’s not Alex laying there, that’s Michael Geurin. “Carla I need an ambulance at the Manes.”</p><p>“Got it Sheriff,” Carla doesn’t say what she really means, or ask what she really wants to; which is did Jesse finally hurt his son in a way that can’t be explained away by teenage boys being teenage boys?</p><p>Michael moves in response to his voice, which means Jesse hasn’t actually fucking killed him.</p><p>Jim kneels by him, tries not to touch him because under the blood he can see bruises and welts and his hand is fucking mess.</p><p>“Don’t try to move son,” he says softly. “Got help coming.”</p><p>“He took Alex,” Michael mumbles, one of his eyes is swollen shut, he doesn’t want to know how long the boy has been laying there if he’s already this bruised and swollen. Doesn’t want to think about how long Jesse and Alex have been really missing because he thought it would be nothing and let it go until his day was done.</p><p>“Do you know if he hurt him?” Jim asks.</p><p>“Don’t know,” Michael manages to say, “don’t… I tried to stop him…” he slurs and Jim touches his head, ignores the way that he’s getting blood on his hands and his pants and that he’s becoming part of the crime scene.</p><p>“Just breathe, help’s coming,” he says, Michael makes a noise and Jim hums under his breath, something with no words that he used to hum when Kyle and Alex were being particularly ornery about going to sleep.</p><p>Michael settles slightly, or he might have lost consciousness. He isn’t dead because Jim can still see his chest moving with the shallow breaths he’s taking.</p><p>He should bundle the boy up and put him the squad car with lights and sirens going and take him to the hospital himself.</p><p>There’s more blood here then just Michael’s, which means wherever Jesse has Alex the boy is hurt likely in the same bad way.</p><p>“Carla, I need an AMBER alert for Alex Manes and a BOLO for Jesse and I need them going out yesterday.”</p><p> </p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p> ********************************</p>
</div><p> </p><p>He’s got deputies back at the tool-shed taking pictures and he stays with Michael on the trip to the hospital. He’d given the boy his hand in the ambulance when the crew was trying to determine how bad his injuries were and likely hurting himself more by trying not to react to their poking and prodding.</p><p>“Just squeeze it as hard as you need,” he’d told him and the boy had looked at him through the one good eye and squeezed his hand as they pushed and prodded and started IV’s and tried to clear off the worst of the blood to see the damage.</p><p>The hand being cradled to his chest is broken, Jim’s thinking a hammer or some other heavy tool, he can’t even imagine why Jesse would attack the boys with a hammer.</p><p>Why Jesse would even fathom that assaulting a 17-year-old with a hammer wasn’t going to get him into trouble that Jim wouldn’t be able brush away with a boys being boys.</p><p>They get the cart off the ambulance and Jim runs alongside it because Michael still hasn’t let go of his hand. He can see his wife huddled by the Emergency room desk with Kyle right next to her and the doctors finally manage to peel Michael’s hand off him and stop him at the door.</p><p>He stands there for a minute and just stares at the blood on his hands, doesn’t look down any further to where he’s sure it’s soaked into his jeans, spattered on his shirt.</p><p>He’s going to have to bag these as evidence.</p><p>“Jim?” Michelle asks, her eyes are wide and she’s got one arm over Kyle’s shoulder.</p><p>He doesn’t touch them, he can’t, he has literal blood on his hands at the moment and he’s not sure how much of it is from the boy behind that swinging door or how much of it is the boy they haven’t found yet.</p><p> </p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p> ********************************</p>
</div><p> </p><p>Michael goes into surgery almost immediately, Jim would think that’s a small blessing because maybe by the time he comes out they’ll have found Alex.</p><p> </p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p> ********************************</p>
</div><p> </p><p>“We’ve got roadblocks set up into and out of town, Sheriff,” Deputy Lancer says. He’s young, they’re all young now it feels like or maybe he’s just getting old sitting here waiting for news.</p><p>“Let me know when they’ve found anything,” he says and Deputy nods and heads out.</p><p>The Evans show up and he’s not sure why they’re there. None of them look to be in distress of any sort, except both kids look like they’re going to start sobbing at any minute and their mom looks to be at a loss as to how to deal with them so.</p><p>“Are they friends of Michael’s?” he asks Kyle, his son is sitting sullenly next to him. Michelle went to find coffee an hour ago and hasn’t returned to continue dealing with him.</p><p>“They’re siblings or something,” Kyle shrugs, he looks bored but Jim knows he’s hyper aware of every movement going on around them.</p><p>“Shouldn’t you be out helping look for him?” Kyle asks suddenly half a mutter so Jim has to strain to hear him.  The Evans boy must have bat ears or something because his head swings in their direction even as he’s bent close to his sister.</p><p>“They’ll let me know when they find one of them,” Jim says, he’s too close to the situation. Jesse has been his best friend since they were kids. Tie in their families entwined histories and the cluster fuck that is the current Project Shepherd situation…</p><p>They don’t want Jim finding Jesse first, it’s also why he hasn’t called Mimi because she’s been muttering about Jesse going off the rail for years. This is just going to prove her entire point and he doesn’t need to hear the ‘I told you so’.</p><p>His fingers brush over his phone, he should put that aside, should suck it up and let her get it out and call her anyway.</p><p>Chances are he’s going to need her to find Alex, because he knows in his gut that when they find Jesse he’s not going to have Alex with him.</p><p> </p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p> ********************************</p>
</div><p> </p><p>“Sheriff?” the doctor comes out from behind the swinging doors what feels like hours later.</p><p>“How is he?” Jim comes to his feet, Kyle and Michelle half a second behind him. Across the hallway the Evans are on their feet as well, the girl’s eyes are red and swollen and her brother looks to be holding his breath.</p><p>“Surgery went fine, he’s probably going to need at least one more after the swelling goes down some so we can see what we’re actually dealing with. Someone did some real damage to the boys’ hand,” the doctor says.</p><p>“Let me know as soon as he’s conscious and can answer some questions?”</p><p> </p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p> ********************************</p>
</div><p> </p><p>“I can’t believe you didn’t call me as soon as this happened,” Mimi hisses at him, she grabs his arm shooting a thin smile at Michelle before dragging him along behind her down the hallway out of earshot of the others.</p><p>“And what were you going to do? We haven’t found Jesse yet, we haven’t found Alex, Michael’s been out of surgery for about an hour, but he hasn’t even regained consciousness yet.”</p><p>“I told you, months ago I told you, there was something <i>wrong</i> with Jesse,” she snaps. “Do you believe me now?”</p><p> </p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p> ********************************</p>
</div><p> </p><p>He allows Mimi to drag him away by his arm like he’s a teenager being dragged off to be scolded in private by an angry parent. Michelle is watching them with narrowed eyes, and he can <i>almost</i> see the questions already forming.</p><p>But Mimi isn’t Helena, she’s tied up in <i>other</i> secrets that he’s hidden from his wife and it’s been so many years now that coming honest about anything is going to see him locked in a padded room or dead.</p><p>“Tell me what’s happened,” Mimi demands, she’s angry but calm. He’s not sure what she would or wouldn’t have heard already.</p><p>“You already know the worst of it,” Jim says, because the town grapevine has <i>got</i> to already be buzzing.</p><p>Cops at the Manes’ house, and not even military cops, at least not yet. Regular Roswell cops and crime scene tape wrapped around the shed in the back and one boy taken away on a stretcher, the other one missing and determined to be still in the custody of his father.</p><p>He’s been praying since they found Michael that finding Alex won’t be far behind. But as the hours tick past and Jesse remains hidden he’s left with a faltering hope for Alex’s continued survival and a stunning realization that he might be making <i>another</i> phone call to a <i>different</i> angry woman to tell her that her youngest son is dead.</p><p>“Tell me you’ve found him then,” Mimi says, “tell me that you found Alex and that the town gossips are just falling down on the job, tell me…”</p><p>“We haven’t found him yet, either one of them,” Jim says and Mimi’s swallow seems to echo in the quiet, he can <i>hear</i> her breath stuttering.</p><p>“Jesus, what is he thinking,” Mimi whispers, her hands are shaking when she drags her fingers through her hair. She rolls her shoulders and looks at them. Expression going hard.</p><p>“If we find Jesse first and we don’t find Alex are you going to be able to…” Jim waves a hand at her and Mimi rolls her eyes.</p><p>“If it gets Alex back home in one piece you <i>know</i> I will,” she says. Even though she promised way back at the beginning, when they were still kids that didn’t know what being tied into Project Shepherd really meant, that she wouldn’t use that gift against them.</p><p>That the three of them needed to be able to trust each other implicitly.</p><p>That means Mimi not delving into their minds.</p><p>That means Jim looking the other way more times then he would care to admit.</p><p>That means Jesse taking over a project that when they were kids, he’d professed no desire to even be a part of.</p><p> </p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p> ********************************</p>
</div><p> </p><p> </p><p>
  <a id="cutid1-end" name="cutid1-end"></a>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Book 1: Chapter 2</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <b>Legacies 2/?</b><br/>
</p><p> </p><p>Michael is peering out of his one good eye, the other has a bandage taped over it and there’s bruises and cuts littering his face and his arms, it looks like he tried to defend himself at one point. Though the bruising on his neck indicates that Jesse had gotten close enough to wrap his fingers around Michael’s neck.</p><p>“Sheriff,” the boy drawls and in the corner is his case worker, no one had responded from his last foster home which means that she’ll be taking him back to a group home if he’s discharged from the hospital before his eighteenth birthday rolls around.</p><p>Or maybe he’ll be going home with the Evans’, for all that the dad has been and gone and seemed completely disinterested in what was happening; the mother has been slightly more watchful. He can see wheels turning, especially as her two kids don’t allow her to take them home.</p><p>“Can you tell me what happened son?” Jim asks, he sits in the chair by the bed.  Keeps the tone of his voice light and as nonjudgmental as he can.</p><p>The boy looks at him, looks over at the case worker, then back at him. There’s hopeless despair in his eye. For himself, for Alex.</p><p>“We weren’t even doing anything,” he mumbles and Jim nods.</p><p>“He was just there, in the doorway,” Michael’s pulling his injured hand to his chest, to protect it from Jesse who is not in the room, or from Jim he’s not sure. His lips are trembling, and Jim doesn’t want to be asking questions, wants to take everything at face value and let the Evans kids into the room and get out there searching for Alex and Jesse.</p><p>But it has to be documented if they’re going to make anything stick to Jesse.</p><p>“He was mad and he,” Michael’s voice slurs a bit and Jim can see tears welling up in the one eye. “He went after Alex, had his hand around his throat and I just…” he sniffles and turns his head so he’s not looking at Jim. He’s looking out the window where it’s night now and nothing can be seen.</p><p>Jim nods at him, but doesn’t say anything.</p><p>“I wanted him off Alex so I grabbed his arm and he,” Michael swallows noisily, breath coming in harsh pants. “There was a hammer and…”</p><p>“Jesus,” the case worker murmurs, Jim hazards a glance in her direction and she’s got her hands over her mouth, tears in <i>her</i> eyes.</p><p>“He hit me, he tried to…” Michael waves vaguely in the direction of his neck. “Alex tried to, he was pulling on his arms, screaming something and his dad just hit him until he was on the ground, he was… there was a lot of blood.”</p><p>“It’s okay,” Jim says, even though it’s not and it probably won’t be for a very long time.</p><p>Not for either boy.</p><p>“He was really hurt,” Michael says softly, “you found him, right?”</p><p>“We’re working on it.”</p><p> </p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p> ********************************</p>
</div><p> </p><p>He can’t stand around doing nothing so he goes back to the station, Michelle has already left so he takes Kyle with him when he goes.</p><p>“He’s going to be okay, right?” Kyle asks, Jim doesn’t know who he’s referring to, he’s never mentioned Michael Guerin at any point so he’s just going to assume that he’s asking about Alex.</p><p>“We’re going to find him,” Jim promises, though he knows it sounds hollow and false to his own ears. He doesn’t look over at his son who is probably looking at him with disbelief.</p><p>He contemplates taking him home, but also doesn’t want Kyle getting a sliver of an idea and trying to go off and find Alex himself.</p><p>Instead he takes him to the station, nodding at the chairs in his office that Kyle rolls his eyes at, though he also slouches down in one of them.</p><p>“Carla, what do we know?” he asks when he shuts the door to his office so his seventeen year old kid isn’t listening in.</p><p>“Deputy Lancer called in about twenty minutes ago that they spotted Jesse Manes’ car,” Carla says, Jim raises an eyebrow at her and she purses her lips at him and narrows her eyes. “You were on your way in, the Deputy is waiting for backup and they’ll bring Jesse in one way or another.”</p><p>“What about Alex?” he asks and Carla bites her lip and looks away.</p><p>“He doesn’t have Alex in the car with him,” he mutters, he drags a hand through his hair and thinks. Says a little prayer that wherever Alex is he’s still alive enough for them to help him out.</p><p>“Jesus,” he mutters and heads into his office to call Mimi and tell her to come down to the station so they can destroy all the promises they’ve made to one another.</p><p> </p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p> ********************************</p>
</div><p> </p><p>Jesse is horribly docile when they bring him in. Hands cuffed behind his back and Mimi is standing right beside him, he can <i>feel</i> her jolt when she notices the blood on him.</p><p>He’s made the barest attempt to clean up. But there’s blood on his shirt and jeans and Jim knows some of it is probably Michael’s, and some of it is Alex’s.</p><p>Jesse doesn’t look at either one of them, doesn’t even seem to be aware of their presence or of where he is.</p><p>“Do you believe me now?” Mimi says softly. “There is something <i>wrong</i> with him.”</p><p>“Did you get anything?” he asks instead of answering and Mimi shakes her head.</p><p>“He can’t block for shit, so there’s definitely something else going on. He’s foggy, I just glanced at the surface and he might not have acknowledged us but he damn well knew we were both here.”</p><p>“If Alex is dead there won’t be any protecting him,” Jim says and Mimi shakes her head.</p><p>“Honey, even if Alex is alive, which he is so don’t even go thinking that way, there’s no protecting him anymore. The minute he raised his hands to them he was done for. You should be thinking on what we’re going to tell that boy’s mama regardless, because he’s going to need someone here now that Jesse has gone off the deep end.”</p><p>“I’m not making that phone call,” he says, and Mimi rolls her eyes at him.</p><p>“I’ll call her, she likes me more then she likes you anyway. But I’m also waiting until we have some sort of news on Alex, I’m not going to break her for no reason.</p><p>“She’s going to want to kill him.”</p><p>Mimi laughs, “she’s going to have to wait in line at this point.”</p><p> </p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p> ********************************</p>
</div><p> </p><p>They have a very short window before the military is going to intervene and yank Jesse out of their custody, Jim knows this.</p><p>“Where is he?” he asks when the door has closed behind him and he’s seated in the chair across from Jesse.</p><p>Mimi is on the other side of the glass, one of the Deputies is by the door, he’ll go get her if Jim gestures at him.</p><p>“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Jesse says, his voice is clipped and even and the eyes that raise up to meet Jim’s are dark and challenging.</p><p>“This’ll go a lot easier on you if you tell us where Alex is, help us get to him before you have a murder charge over your head instead of two attempted ones.”</p><p>Jesse rolls his eyes, leans back in his chairs as far as the cuffs around his wrist secured to the table will allow him to.</p><p>“Michael Guerin is alive,” Jim says, and the only sign that Jesse even comprehends what he’s saying is the visible swallow. Otherwise his expression doesn’t change at all. “He’s alive and conscious and we already know what happened, we already know you physically assaulted the boy, that you assaulted your son…”</p><p>“He’s an abomination.”</p><p>“He’s your fucking <i>son</i>, Jesse,” Jim hisses. “He’s your flesh and blood, your youngest boy, we don’t raise our hands against our own kids, we protect them to the best of our abilities at all times we’re allowed to.”</p><p>“That’s your daddy speaking,” Jesse sneers, “No son of mine would have brought that boy back to where we lived and thought it was okay to do what they did, I did him a favor. I did <i>them</i> a favor, better they learn those hard lessons now on what type of behavior is acceptable and not acceptable.”</p><p>Jim just stares at him, this is <i>not</i> the Jesse he grew up with that held Alex in his hands hours after his birth and looked at him with the same love and devotion as he’d looked at his other boys. This is not <i>any</i> Jesse that he’s ever had personal dealings with and he’s seen Jesse at what he thought was his worst.</p><p>He doesn’t even look at the Deputy, maybe Mimi on the other side of the glass has realized that nothing Jim says is going to get through to Jesse. That he’s already lost to them, all that’s left is to salvage what pieces they can.</p><p>“Where is he?” Mimi demands and Jesse just looks at her, cocks an eyebrow at her and looks so much like his father that Jim has to hide the shudder.</p><p>Jesse doesn’t even say anything and Mimi is still next to him, not even shaking her fury.</p><p>“Where. Is. He?”</p><p>“Stay out of my head, Mimi,” Jesse says slowly, eyes dark hands clenching into fists on the table and Jim touches Mimi’s arm.</p><p>“I know where he is,” Mimi says, eyes still locked with Jesse’s, she leans forward, hands planted on the table. “I hope you burn in hell.”</p><p>Jim pushes his chair back and stands, wraps a hand around Mimi’s arm.</p><p>“You know where he is?” he asks, he ignores Jesse, focuses all his attention on Mimi until Mimi looks away and at him.</p><p>“I know where he is,” she nods, “we need to be fast though.”</p><p> </p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p> ********************************</p>
</div><p> </p><p> </p><p>
  <a id="cutid1-end" name="cutid1-end"></a>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Book 1: Chapter 3</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <b>Legacies 3/?</b><br/>
</p><p> </p><p>Mimi marks the general location of where Jesse left Alex on a map, Jim ignores the skeptical Deputies milling around waiting for direction and his wife hovering in the door of his office.</p><p>“You’re sure?” Jim asks, even though he knows that Mimi is sure. She’s not going to be sending them on a wild goose chase, she wants Alex found just as badly as Jim does.</p><p>Just as badly as likely Jesse <i>doesn’t</i>.</p><p>“He wasn’t conscious when Jesse left him there, but it’s been hours,” Mimi says, her eyes are dark.</p><p>“Don’t go back in there,” Jim warns and Mimi huffs at him and rolls her eyes. “Please, Mimi.”</p><p>“I’m going to go to the hospital and check on young Mr. Geurin and wait for you to come back with Alex,” Mimi says finally.</p><p>“How bad…” he starts to ask and then stops; he wants to ask how bad it had been in Jesse’s mind.</p><p>“You need to hurry,” Mimi says, “I don’t want to explain this to Maria and I’m sure you don’t want to be explaining this to Kyle.”</p><p> </p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p> ********************************</p>
</div><p> </p><p>The spot Mimi marked on the map encompasses about a half mile radius. Jim’s not sure if she didn’t get an exact location because Jesse didn’t really <i>know</i> where he left Alex or if she wasn’t quite sure where in that radius it was.</p><p>“Fan out,” he says and he’s got Lancer on his left when he starts moving through the thick brush. Pushing through with determination that he’s not leaving here unless he has Alex in hand.</p><p>The sun is just starting to come up though they still have flashlights in hand, and it’s not really cold, it’s that dawn cold where the sun hasn’t risen but the night has completely receded, he still shivers when he notices the red staining a patch of brush and debris.</p><p>His heart is in his throat when he shifts it aside just enough to see, then he has to remind himself that breathing isn’t optional.</p><p>“Oh dear god,” Lancer murmurs next to him and if Jim looked he’s sure he would be crossing himself. Jim swallows thickly and takes slow even breaths.</p><p>“Go,” he says and he doesn’t look over at where he’s sure Lancer is nodding blindly and backing away. There’s an ambulance back with the vehicles.</p><p>He moves closer and its definitely Alex. Jesse has covered him with fallen branches and Jim takes another steadying breath before he goes to his knees next to him.</p><p>Knees of another uniform getting ruined by the blood of another boy that Jesse Manes has brutalized. He’s covered in blood and Jim reaches out a trembling hand to grasp his wrist, praying for a pulse of any sort. He doesn’t even have a chance to press his fingers to check before Alex is moaning low and deep in his throat.</p><p>He doesn’t open his eyes but Jim bows his head and closes <i>his</i> eyes momentarily in relief.</p><p>“You’re okay now,” he whispers, Alex doesn’t respond, doesn’t move or react at all. Jim trails his fingers against Alex’s forehead, cupping the top of his head in his hand.</p><p>“You’re okay now.”</p><p> </p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p> ********************************</p>
</div><p> </p><p>He rides in the ambulance, a second trip with a second boy and this one doesn’t stir or respond at all as the EMT’s take note of his injuries and relay them to the whoever is at the hospital waiting for them to arrive.</p><p>Jim stays as far out of their way as he can manage, he’d been going to hold onto Alex’s hand like he’d held onto Michael’s but he’d been quietly and firmly shifted away so he rests it against Alex’s foot which appears to be the only part of him not covered in blood.</p><p>“He’s not even aware right now,” he was told when he tried to kick up a fuss, and he runs his thumb over his radio. He’s already called it in, they know Alex has been found.</p><p>Mimi should be on her way to the hospital, as should Michelle though he’s hoping that Kyle isn’t with her. The last thing he wants is for his son to see Alex like this, covered in blood drawn by the hands of his father.</p><p>“Sheriff,” one of the EMT’s catches his attention and from the look on his face it looks like he’d been trying to gain it for a while.</p><p>He looks over at where Alex is still unconscious, there’s a brace wrapped around his neck and the EMT’s had been going on about possible head injuries and trauma and he can already tell by how they wrapping things that one of Alex’s arms is broken, he’s sure there’s internal trauma of some sort, though they likely won’t know the extent of what damage Jesse has done to his boy until they get to the hospital.</p><p>“You can move back if you want,” the EMT offers, Jim goes to nod and move though a glance out the front of the cab shows them coming up on the hospital, so he doesn’t. Just keeps his hand wrapped around Alex’s ankle as the ambulance pulls up.</p><p>The doors open and there’s a flurry of motion as the doors open. He doesn’t listen to the list of injuries; he’s been listening as they were transmitted to the hospital while they were enroute.</p><p>He’s already numb at the thought that if they’d been delayed any more time, if Mimi hadn’t been able to get into Jesse’s head, if Mimi hadn’t been willing to break a promise made when they were kids…</p><p>Alex would be dead and Jim would be mentally plotting murder.</p><p>The hospital lights are bright and like before when he came in with Michael, he’s stopped at a swinging door and has yet another child’s blood on his hands.</p><p>Mimi is the first to approach, he can see past her shoulder where Maria is hovering with Liz both with wide startled eyes, Kyle is turned away from him and them. Shoulders hunched and hands clenched into fists at his side.</p><p>“Jim,” she says carefully, her hands out in front of her like he’s a spooked animal that is just as likely to kick her in the face then accept her comfort.</p><p>“He’s alive,” Jim says, he’s bone tired all of a sudden now that the adrenaline rush of needing to find Alex has passed. He wants to find a quiet corner to pass out in.</p><p>“Why don’t we go get you cleaned up,” she says, she doesn’t touch him and Jim casts a glance down and can see red.</p><p>Blood on his shirt, his pants, his hands.</p><p>He closes his eyes and lets out a low shuddering breath.</p><p>“He’s alive,” he says again, a reminder more to himself then to anyone else that just because he’s wearing a whole lot of Alex’s blood on him that the boy is still alive somewhere rooms away and that the doctors and nurses with him now are going to fight to keep him that way.</p><p> </p>
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</div><p> </p><p>Someone finds him a set of scrubs to change into, another uniform going into another evidence bag just in case.</p><p>He has Lancer come take the bag back to the station with him, there’s a few out at the location where they found Alex but Jim thinks that was just supposed to be Jesse’s dumping ground.</p><p>He’s cleaned most of Alex’s blood off his skin, but he keeps catching glimpses of red under his fingernails and scrubbing his hands in the sink doesn’t seem to be working. He wonders if this is how he goes crazy, with Alex’s blood staining his skin reminding him of his failure to keep the boy safe, even from his own father.</p><p>He scrubs and scrubs until his hands feel raw and Alex’s blood is still there, every time he looks Alex’s blood is still on his hands.</p><p>“Jim,” Mimi says from the door and he can’t even turn to face her, doesn’t need to because if he looks up he’ll be able to see her face in the mirror right in front of him.</p><p>Her eyes judging him for not taking action sooner, even though <i>she</i> didn’t take action sooner either.</p><p>“He could have killed him,” he says.</p><p>“But he didn’t, and Alex is safe now.”</p><p>Jim laughs, it sounds hollow to his own ears.</p><p>“He should have been safe all along,” he wraps his hands around the edge of the sink and bows his head, gripping it tight. “If he…”</p><p>“He’s not going to die,” Mimi says, her voice hard and low, she wraps her hand around his arm and squeezes. “Now pull yourself together because we don’t have a lot of time to play with here.”</p><p>“Mimi…”</p><p>“We talked about this,” she says and he looks over at her. Her eyes are determined, she’s never liked Caulfield and what it meant, the history that linked their three families together.</p><p>When they were kids, introduced to family legacies that not a single fucking one of them wanted to be a part of, they’d talked about destroying the entire thing.</p><p>Emptying out the cells that have been slowly being emptied by natural causes as those contained within them die of old age or illness.</p><p>None of them wanted to be part of the murder and captivity of the alien visitors that they were introduced to.</p><p>He’s not sure when that changed, when Jesse started being okay with the experiments being performed, when Jim himself became just numb to the pain and suffering and when Mimi stopped fighting them on it and just went along because two overruled one and she wasn’t going to be the one lone voice of dissent and cut out because of it.</p><p>“There’s no way we’re going to be able to get them all out before they cut off our access.”</p><p>“Then stop fucking dillydallying around,” Mimi hisses. “There’s nine of them left, we take two vehicles we can get nine of them out and no one will be the wiser.”</p><p>“Someone has to be here, what if they need authorization for Alex…” Jim starts.</p><p>“Then I’ll do it,” comes the soft voice from the doorway, both their heads swing around, he hadn’t even heard the door open.</p><p>Mindy Manes looks almost exactly as she did the last time he saw her when she was leaving Jesse and her boys, though she definitely has less facial bruising then that day.</p><p>“I’ll stay here,” she says, voice stronger and her arms cross over her chest. “You go do whatever it is you need to do, he’s my son, I’ll be here.”</p><p> </p>
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  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>So apparently we have names now for Alex's mom and brothers. Mindy doesn't feel like a real name for Alex's mom, but *shrugs*. And Flint, Gregory &amp; Clay for Alex's three brothers.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. Book 1: Chapter 4</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <b>Legacies 4/?</b><br/>
</p><p>The ride is quiet, he keeps the radio loud so he can distract himself from thinking. He periodically checks the rear-view mirror to make sure Mimi is still right behind him.</p><p>When he pulls into the dirt road that leads to the facility that is only called Caulfield in the secrecy of files that he doesn’t allow himself to think too closely about he notices the silence.</p><p>The shack that would normally have a uniformed guard waiting to greet them is empty, the gate that should be locked partially open.</p><p>“Fuck,” he mutters under his breath and he parks right in front of the building, his hands tighten around the steering wheel before he lets it go. Rolls his shoulders and opens the door, Mimi is already looking over the hood of her vehicle at him, wide horrified eyes.</p><p>“Don’t,” he holds up a hand, “we don’t know anything for sure until we get inside.”</p><p>“You know the protocol just like I do,” Mimi reminds him.</p><p>“We don’t know, it hasn’t been that long, doing a transfer takes time and they don’t even have anywhere to take them.”</p><p>Mimi raises an eyebrow at him but closes her door and steps toward the front of the building, Jim following.</p><p>“We check the cells first,” he says, pulling the keycard out of his pocket and waving it at the reader, it flashes green and the door buzzes. At the very least they’re not locked out yet, though he’s sure that’s probably an oversight on someone’s part.</p><p>“I’ll check the cells, you pull documents, we’re going to need something in case they try and come after them again.”</p><p>Jim holds the door open then drags a hand through his hair.</p><p>“I might have already started taking copies out about a year ago,” he says, Mimi glances over at him surprise though she doesn’t stop moving.</p><p>“Look just because Jesse fell in line and drank the crazy juice didn’t mean we all did, we talked about this, how we didn’t want this, I was just making sure if we managed to get to the point where we could do anything that we had you know actual documents and facts to support the fact that we weren’t all fucking crazy ass lunatics foaming at the mouth about aliens.”</p><p> </p>
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</div><p> </p><p>Caulfield has never been a bustling place, the few times that Jim has been there in the last year he’s normally met by at least one to two patrolling two-man teams.</p><p>There’s no one, not a single solitary soul and there’s a heavy weight in his heart and gut.</p><p>Had Jesse been that far gone from them that he’d already engineered transfers if something had happened to him? There were nine left, 4 women, 5 men.</p><p>He’s half managed to convince himself that the cells are going to be empty, he’s failed Alex, he’s failed Michael why not fail these other nameless nine.</p><p>The first cell is empty, but it’s been empty for almost six months now, the second has someone in it and he releases a breath he hadn’t even realized he’d been holding.</p><p>“I’m going to unlock the doors,” Mimi says, she squeezes his arm as she passes and the woman in the cell that had been laying still in her bunk stirs.</p><p>The others start to stir as well, like they’re realizing that something is happening outside of the normal and as Jim looks around, he can see all nine coming to their feet, moving slowly to the doors to peer out.</p><p>The alarm is loud when it goes off, then the doors squeal on their hinges as they open.</p><p>He insanely thinks that they need to get one of the maintenance guys to look at those, then reminds himself that those doors won’t be closing behind them so there’s no need.</p><p>Mimi is back as Jim stands there turning in a circle, the nine are moving slowly out of the cells, drab clothes hanging off thin frames. Bare feet on the concrete floors; Mimi’s mom van can hold five, he can take the other four with him, though it’ll be a tight squeeze in the backseat.</p><p>“It looks like they just picked up and left,” Mimi murmurs, she touches the arm of one the women, strokes a hand down one of the men’s as she passes by them back to his side.</p><p>“Probably when I put the BOLO out on Jesse,” Jim says, he lets out a long even breath and thinks, “we should move them out fast, before someone higher up the food chain changes their mind and wants proof of their murders or something.”</p><p>“Where are we even going to put them?” Mimi asks, “I can’t close the Pony for that long, and the apartment is a tight squeeze for me, Maria and whatever Maria’s cause of the week is, I’m not going to be able to hide them from her.”</p><p>“My hunting cabin?” Mimi makes a face, “it’s got running water and power, it’s secluded. The boys, Jesse and Michelle are the only ones that have spent any time at it.”</p><p>And Rosa, but Jim doesn’t say that, though Mimi arches a brow at him indicating that she knows who he left off that list.</p><p>Chances are Alex is going to be hospitalized long past graduation, Jesse is going to be locked up for probably not as long as Jim is hoping for and Kyle only went to the cabin when Alex and Jesse were going with them, his son isn’t really one for roughing it.</p><p>“It is private,” Mimi concedes, she holds out her arm and starts directing the nine towards the nearest exit, “do you even have any supplies out there though?”</p><p>“Enough for a couple of days, by then it’ll hopefully things will have quieted down enough that we can make a run and stock them up, figure out what exactly we’re going to do.”</p><p>“I hate to bring it up but we’re probably going to need to talk to Mindy about it,” Mimi says quietly, Jim just looks at her. “She was always tight lipped about it, but you know they hid some of them on the reservation originally, Mindy could open those dialogues up. See if any of those that managed to avoid getting caught up still survive.”</p><p>“She could also shoot me in the face for the fact that I let her ex-husband put her youngest boy in the hospital,” Jim mutters.</p><p>“Well <i>I’m</i> going to talk to Mindy about our options, if you figure out where you hid your dick maybe you can man up and help us figure out a solution that doesn’t have us locking even more people back up in these cells.”</p><p> </p>
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</div><p> </p><p>He’s not sure how they decide to split up, they don’t speak to one another but four of them move to his car the remaining five trailing along after Mimi to hers.</p><p>He holds his breath until all of them are in the vehicles and he’s leading the way back away from Caulfield, some unknown tension releasing as they pass the gates, and no one leaps from the bushes with automatic weapons or rocket launchers.</p><p>He lets out a long breath as they pull out on the main road, Mimi sticking close to him as he speeds up.</p><p>“What happened?” the man who had chosen or been selected to ride in the front with him asks when they’re several miles away from Caulfield. He can’t even see the shadow of it in his rearview mirror though he thinks the shadow of Caulfield is going to cast a long shadow across the rest of his life.</p><p>“What do you mean?” he asks, his hands grip tight onto the wheel and he breathes. The sooner they put them in the cabin, behind a closed door hidden from view instead of the windows on all sides of their vehicles the more he’ll relax.</p><p>“The guards left in a flurry at some point about a day ago, I think we all figured we’d been left to die long painful, solitary deaths. But then you and she arrived and now here we are…” the man leads.</p><p>Jim taps his thumb against the wheel, tries not to think about Jesse locked in a cell in his jail, of Alex fighting for his life or Michael who he’s sure hasn’t even been told Alex has been found.</p><p>“Sergeant Manes has harmed someone?” the man asks quietly and Jim swallows thickly.</p><p>“His son, his youngest boy, Alex,” Jim finally manages to say. “And another boy as well, Michael.”</p><p>“They’re okay, though?”</p><p>“We found Michael yesterday, we didn’t manage to get Jesse into custody, figure out where he’d hidden Alex until early this morning, he’s…” Jim stops, glances in the rear view mirror to prove they’re out of sight of Caulfield, that Mimi is right behind them. “We’re hopeful.”</p><p>The man nods, eventually Jim is going to need learn names, the man, the woman, he can’t continue to refer to them that way. While they were still locked in cells it was a way for him to separate himself from them, if they didn’t have names then they weren’t real.</p><p>They’re now very real and sitting next to him and behind him and every single one of them would likely kill him without a second thought if it meant staying out of Caulfield for what remains of their lives.</p><p> </p>
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<a name="section0005"><h2>5. Book 1: Chapter 5</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <b>Legacies 5/?</b><br/>
</p><p>The cabin is remote, there’s no one else around for miles. They’ll be safe here while he and Mimi make more long-term plans to hide them from anyone who might still be looking for them.</p><p>It is telling though that Jesse gets taken into custody and the small contingent of soldiers manning security at Caulfield were pulled out. He wonders how long the military has been contemplating the breaking of ties with Caulfield, to shove it under a rug where no one can see it and question how many laws were being broken on a daily basis there.</p><p>It’s dark even with the curtains open and there’s a thin film of dust on everything.</p><p>“Have you even been up here recently?” Mimi asks as the nine mill around the open living room.</p><p>He’s given them all the nickel tour, it’s going to be cramped until they figure out next moves. But he thinks they’ll all agree that cramped and free is hands down better than brightly lit cells and whatever Jesse was having done to them that Jim and Mimi weren’t privy to.</p><p>“Not in months, Jesse had been busy and the boys…” he’s not going to lie to himself, there has been a steadily growing rift between Kyle and Alex for months now, maybe even longer than a year.</p><p>Kyle has been surprisingly closed mouth about it which means he knows it’s going to be because of something he would likely take Kyle to task for.</p><p>“There should be some emergency rations that can tide them over until we can get them stocked up.”</p><p>“This screams horror movie to me,” Mimi says, she looks less than impressed and Jim arches a brow and waits for her to offer a better solution.</p><p>She scowls at him, because there <i>isn’t</i> a better solution. Not until they can talk to Mindy and have her open up dialogues with the necessary people at the reservation.</p><p>“She’s going to spit in both our faces,” Mimi says, “and she’ll be right to do it, we did wrong by both her and her boys.”</p><p>Jim sighs, but doesn’t argue with her, at the very least they did wrong by Mindy and Alex.</p><p>Clay and Greg had already been out of the house, and Flint had been a year older and while he didn’t hang around with the two younger boys Jim had never noticed a single bruise on Flint.</p><p>Not like the ones that he’d seen on Alex before Alex and Jesse got better at hiding them from view.</p><p>“Will you be okay?” Jim asks, the older man who had rode with him and asked questions that still make Jim’s heart hurt nods. He seems to be the groups’ unofficial spokesperson, though one of the older women leans into his side and whispers in his ear. He shakes his head and she looks disappointed.</p><p>“Is something wrong?” Mimi asks, eyes bright and the woman that looks disappointed shakes her head, turning her eyes away.</p><p>“Nothing that can’t wait on your return,” the man says firmly.</p><p>“Hospital first,” Mimi says, wrapping her hand around Jim’s wrist. “Hospital first then we can figure out how we’re going to buy groceries and hide the fact that we did since they aren’t going to end up in either of our houses.”</p><p>Jim doesn’t sigh, but only because he’s been so busy that there’s no way that Michelle could logically thing he was having an affair.</p><p> </p>
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</div><p> </p><p>They walk into the hospital and its complete pandemonium.</p><p>There’s Michael in a wheelchair, the Evans boy has his hands wrapped around the bars tightly and his sister is right next to him with her hand on Michael’s shoulder.</p><p>The thing that is most surprising is the Evans kids’ mom standing shoulder to shoulder with Mindy both of them arguing loudly with what Jim is assuming is the Doctor in charge of Alex’s care.</p><p>“We were literally gone for less than five hours,” Mimi grumbles then stares at him until Jim puts his fingers to his mouth and whistles.</p><p>It shocks the group enough that they all back up a step and go quiet.</p><p>“Thank god,” the doctor says and if looks could kill he would be locking Mindy and the Evans’ mom up for murder.</p><p>“What is going on?” he asks as he makes his way to the group, Michael looks pale and angry in his wheelchair, he’s holding his injured hand to his chest.</p><p>“They were going to let me see Alex,” he says softly.</p><p>“Okay, what seems to be the problem then?” he turns to the doctor. The doctor looks at him, looks between the group and Jim and finally huffs an annoyed sounding sigh.</p><p>“The boy is minor, he can’t go in by himself,” the doctor says finally then stalks away like he’s done with them and has said his peace.</p><p>“I’ll go in with him,” Mimi says before he can get the words out to offer, the look she shoots him demands he talk to Mindy immediately or face her wrath.</p><p> </p>
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</div><p> </p><p>“Tell me he’s locked up somewhere that he won’t see the light of day?” Mindy asks when he leads her out of the hospital.</p><p>When he looks over at her she’s horribly pale and there are lines in her face that he doesn’t remember being there the last time he saw her in person.</p><p>“I’ve got him in a jail cell,” he confirms. He doesn’t know how long he’ll be able to <i>keep</i> Jesse there before the military or someone else will saunter in and snatch him away. “Mindy…”</p><p>“He’s not regained consciousness yet,” she says softly, “they cleaned him up and did stitches and set his broken bones and…” her voice wobbles and breaks. She lets out a panting breath and her swallow is loud in the silence outside the hospital.</p><p>“They’re talking about pressure on his brain and they might need to do surgery and… he’s my baby, my little one Jim, how could he…”</p><p>“Mindy…” he starts helplessly, and she scrubs her hands across her face and scowls at the evidence of her tears on her hands.</p><p>He doesn’t know what to say, there’s nothing he <i>can</i> say that will explain away his inaction. Him and Mimi not doing anything when they knew there was something likely really wrong happening in that house is going to haunt him for the remainder of his life.</p><p>If Alex dies because of this…</p><p>“That’s not why we’re out here, though,” she says finally.</p><p>“How do you…”</p><p>“Please, remember who you’re talking to, Jim,” she rolls her eyes at him, looking slightly steadier, more in control then she bad though she also still looks like she’s a hairs breadth away from weeping uncontrollably. “How many were left?”</p><p>“Nine,” he says and she looks surprised when he eyes her.</p><p>“Nine? There used to be…” Jim doesn’t know what to tell her, he <i>knows</i> how many there <i>used</i> to be. He’s never gotten any good answer from Jesse when he’d asked the questions though.</p><p>Just had those questions pushed aside and he should have pushed, he <i>knows</i> he should have pushed.</p><p>But the times when pushing would have accomplished anything are long in the past, and if he’s being honest with himself if he’d actually <i>asked</i> any of those questions Jesse would have figured out a way to side-line him, just like he’d been effectively side-lining Mimi for months.</p><p>“I’ll ask, but I can’t guarantee they’ll take them,” Mindy says slowly. “Do you have them somewhere safe at least?”</p><p>“They’re not locked in cells anymore,” Jim says, he doesn’t elaborate. As much as he’d brought Mindy outside just for the fresh air and to not have every eye in the place looking at them, he’d also brought them outside because he’s seen the list of places where Jesse had cameras and bugs located.</p><p>The hospital had been on the list, cameras and listening devices in the ER, the morgue and two of the family waiting areas.</p><p>Jesse’s locked up, that doesn’t mean that those people he doesn’t have names for that pull Jesse’s strings don’t have someone else already sliding in to take his place.</p><p>That there hadn’t been a contingency plan in place for something like Jim and Mimi going in and taking the survivors out.</p><p> </p>
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</div><p> </p><p>Kyle is sitting by himself in the waiting room, hunched over with his hands clenched between his knees. Jim leaves Mindy by the nurses’ station and goes to sit next to his son.</p><p>“I shouldn’t be here,” Kyle says, he doesn’t look over at him, doesn’t make eye contact at all. His voice sounds small and soft compared to the kid he’s sat across the table and ate meals with.</p><p>“You don’t have to stay,” Jim says, he thinks it might have been the wrong thing to say as Kyle’s knuckles actually go <i>whiter</i> as he clenches his hands tighter together.</p><p>“We’re not even really friends anymore,” he mutters and Jim doesn’t sigh, not out loud, he wants to.</p><p>But he doesn’t.</p><p>“Is this because of the…” he doesn’t say <i>gay thing</i>, Jesse has ranted and raged like a lunatic about the possibility; of all the adults in his life that Alex <i>may</i> have talked about it to Mimi is likely to have been at the top of that list since his mom was not. If he had talked to her about it she was never going to be the one to break a confidence if he had, “You know you can’t catch it right? It’s not a communicable disease or something.”</p><p>“The guys said…”</p><p>“I don’t care what the guys said, if you and Alex had a fight that’s one thing, you had a lot of them when you were kids over the stupidest most nonsensical things; but if you’re not friends because he’s maybe gay that’s something else entirely and we might need to have a different talk.”</p><p>Kyle’s shoulders hunch a bit defensively and he’s still not looking at him, so Jim thinks he’s hit <i>that</i> nail on the head.</p><p>He doesn’t know what to say though, he can’t force Kyle to accept Alex as he is, can’t force the boys to be friends. They’re almost adults now, going to be high school graduates in mere weeks and Kyle won’t thank Jim for lecturing him like a child about it now as much as he really wants to.</p><p>It pains him though, he and Jesse had been best friends all the way through their childhood, when they’d finally had kids that were within the same age group he’d thought they’d be just like them. Follow in their footsteps, Jim and Jesse redux… though without the hovering shadow of Caulfield looming over their shoulders.</p><p>Because back then their plans had been that Caulfield would have been long since emptied and abandoned, Project Shepherd and its remains burnt into ash in a desert, before the need to indoctrinate any of their kids would have been necessary.<br/>
<br/>
All the way up to high school they’d been thick as thieves, and the two of them had ignored overtures from any others that might have tried to infiltrate their little best friend bubble.</p><p>Jim doesn’t know if he can pinpoint when Kyle’s friend group had ceased to include Alex.</p><p> </p>
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<a name="section0006"><h2>6. Book 1: Chapter 6</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <b>Legacies 6/?</b><br/>
</p><p>He takes Kyle home, leaving his son in a quiet house. He’s not sure where Michelle disappeared to, though she wasn’t at the hospital when they left.</p><p>The station is quiet when he gets there and he looks in the holding cells where Jesse is laying on his back, hands folded behind his head and eyes closed. He looks calm and peaceful.</p><p>He has to go into his office and close his door, bury his head in his hands lest he go into that cell and make Jesse dead.</p><p>He’d feel better, but it wouldn’t benefit anyone.</p><p>He breathes, even in and out breaths and tries not to but can’t stop his brain from thinking about glancing into the into the room Alex was in, that he’ll <i>be</i> in for a while.</p><p>Where Michael had been hunched over in his wheelchair next to his bed not touching him and Jim could understand why. There was not a single part of Alex that he could see that wasn’t covered by a bandage of some sort.</p><p>“Jim?” Michelle’s voice is soft in the doorway, he hadn’t even heard it open. Her footsteps are quiet as she comes in, closes the door behind her and comes around the desk.</p><p>When he looks up she’s leaning against the desk next to him.</p><p>“How did I miss the fact that Kyle and Alex weren’t friends anymore?”</p><p>“It’s not like he’s been hiding it,” Michelle says, “I’ve talked to him several times but he’s a teenage boy, he doesn’t want to hear lectures from his mama on right or wrong. He came to the hospital with me the minute we heard that something had happened though, so maybe their friendship won’t be unrepairable.”</p><p>“If I was Alex I’d make him grovel for a very long time,” Jim says and Michelle laughs softly at him, runs a gentle hand over the top of his head. “I’m surprised that you’re here and not at home or at the hospital with Mindy.”</p><p>Michelle shrugs, mouth twisting. “Honestly I was afraid if someone wasn’t here that Jesse would manage to charm his way out of the cell and we’d never see him again.”</p><p>He folds her hand between his, presses a kiss to the top of it and tries to smile at her. “Go home, Jesse isn’t going anywhere, not just yet. I figure the military will start banging on our door in the morning to take custody of him.”</p><p>“I’d say good riddance,” Michelle sighs, “but I have a strong worry that Jesse is going to be handed over to them and they’ll do nothing more than slap his wrist. That man lives under the beams of a golden sun.”</p><p> </p>
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</div><p> </p><p>He meets Mimi in a small grocery store that he’s not familiar with and hopes means that no one he knows will see them stocking the cart with food that will not make it to either of their places of residence.</p><p>There’s a lot of freezer meals and, cans of soup and things that will be quick and easy to show them how to make and won’t require a lot of prep time.</p><p>Jim knows that none of them are stupid, but he also doesn’t know what kind of technology they had where they originally came from, they had spaceships that they travelled to Earth on.</p><p>He’s sure they had machines that they pressed a button and food cooked to their exacting specifications.</p><p>“They’ll figure it out,” Mimi says as they load the bags into back of his jeep. And it says something for how long they’ve known each other that he knows she’s responding to his ruminations instead of just randomly speaking.</p><p>He assumes they’re riding together when Mimi climbs into the passenger side, closing the door firmly behind her and raising an eyebrow at him when he shoots her questioning look.</p><p>“We’ll draw less attention in one vehicle then we would in two cars traveling together to one destination,” she says.</p><p>“Did you get anything from Alex?” he asks when they’re on their way, it’s dark out, it’ll have to be a quick trip there and back.</p><p>“Nothing of importance, boy will have some serious nightmares, but I have faith we’ll get him and his young beau through them.”</p><p>“Beau,” Jim says softly, “so Michael is… that means…”</p><p>“You know I’m not going to betray that boy’s confidence,” Mimi says, “he has so few adults that he can trust to talk to about things and won’t go running back to his father.”</p><p>“That’s going to mean a long arduous path for both of them.”</p><p>“You know Alex doesn’t give two whit’s about any of that, he wants nothing more then to be free of his father’s sphere of influence and possibly be able to make his own choices after graduation instead of being forced into whatever mold Jesse had specially designed for him.”</p><p>“Air Force,” Jim says. “Jesse may have mentioned it once or twice, thought he’d be better able to keep tabs on him and control over him if he was at least in the same branch.”</p><p>“Well thankfully we don’t need to worry anything about that now,” Mimi says brightly as Jim turns into the drive leading up to the cabin.</p><p> </p>
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</div><p> </p><p>When they get inside the cabin, Jim locking the door shut behind them it’s mostly dark. Only a lone light in the open living room on, the door to the two bedrooms are closed.</p><p>He can see the older man that had been the spokesperson and an older woman sitting across from the ach other at the small kitchen table, she has a chipped mug with the ‘world’s best dad’ printed across it in her hands.</p><p>“They’re mostly quick easy meals while we wait and see if we have somewhere safer to take you,” Mimi is saying as she unpacks bags efficiently on the counter and nudges Jim with her elbow to direct him to start putting things in the freezer.</p><p>“We’re likely not going to have enough room for all this,” he frowns, he shifts some stuff around, trying to Tetris everything together and not overload the poor old fridge that had already been in the cabin when he bought it and is probably older then him.</p><p>“I’m sure it will be fine,” the older woman says, Jim finishes settling what he can and closes the freezer, waits for a minute before he turns away to make sure it doesn’t nudge its way open.</p><p>“Nora,” the man starts to say, though he doesn’t continue. Jim is going to need introductions soon, he should probably have done it in the ride away from Caulfield but his worry for Alex had dominated any need to make conversation or connections.</p><p>Mimi likely knows the names, ages and of any children the ones that been in her vehicle.</p><p>“My name is David,” the man, David says, Jim narrows his eyes at him, and David smiles at him in return. It would probably be considered a smirk on anyone else.</p><p>“You think very loudly,” David says kindly and Nora hides her smile behind her cup.</p><p>“Exhaustion, and not needing to temper my thoughts to something that likely wouldn’t have Jesse trying to lock me in a cell right alongside any of you,” Jim says. He sits in the fourth chair at the table.</p><p>“How is the young man?” Nora asks. “David said you talked of a young man that the Sergeant had harmed?”</p><p>“His son, Alex and a friend,” Jim pauses, “probably his boyfriend though he could be just a friend. Michael has some minor injuries, Jesse smashed his hand with a hammer,” he presses a hand to his heart, it feels over and over again like it’s breaking. “He had Alex for a lot longer, he’s more…. He’s a lot more hurt and they don’t…”</p><p>He stops, has to before he gives in to the urge to go back to the station and string Jesse up in the cell he was sleeping peacefully in.</p><p>Why should he be able to sleep peacefully when they get to struggle with the fallout from his actions?</p><p>He wants to ask, wants to beg if there is a healer among the nine they managed to free from Caulfield. But he also doesn’t want them to say no, they won’t help Alex because of who his father is.</p><p>“We would never hold the child responsible for the actions of his father,” David says, the expression on his face is horrified. “He was thinking on asking if we had a healer, if things became dire for his young Alex if he could ask for assistance and then didn’t want to because he didn’t want to be told no. That we wouldn’t help an innocent because his father committed atrocities against us,” he explains when both Nora and Mimi look at him for explanation.</p><p>“We could offer a trade,” Nora says and she and David have a silent conversation with their eyes and the twitching of their lips.</p><p>“A trade?” Jim asks.</p><p>“A healer for Alex, and information for us,” Nora says, she nods a head at David as if indicating the healer that she is offering.</p><p>“What sort of information?” Mimi asks.</p><p>“When we came here, crashed here,” Nora amends. “We had three children with us, they never made their way into the system at Caulfield like so many of the others. If possible, we would like to find them, or at least find out what <i>happened</i> to them.”</p><p>“Nora,” David says softly.</p><p>“David, it’s my son and Louise’s girl, and the other boy,” Nora says, eyes filling with tears. “I need to know what <i>happened</i> to my son, <i>we</i> need to know what happened to them.”</p><p> </p>
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<a name="section0007"><h2>7. Book 1: Chapter 7</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <b>Legacies 7/?</b><br/>
</p><p>He drops Mimi back off at her car, waits until she gets in and starts driving away before he heads to the hospital.</p><p>He has plans to stop in, see Alex, talk to Mindy then maybe head home for a handful hours of sleep before he needs to be up and back at things.</p><p>The hospital is quiet when he enters, and he gets cornered almost immediately by an older nurse that looks vaguely familiar almost as soon as he enters.</p><p>“Sheriff, a word please?” she asks, hand wrapping around his arm and tugging him along behind her into an empty waiting room.</p><p>He raises an eyebrow at her and she flushes a bit.</p><p>“Sorry sir, I didn’t want to miss you,” she says quickly, she’s flushing a spotty red but there is something in her eyes that he doesn’t like the look of. “I tried to call the Sergeant, but he never picked up and he said if I ever couldn’t get in touch with him that I should get in touch with you.”</p><p>He looks at her and she shoves a folder at him, he glances at it, see the name tab marked across the top and tries to remember that breathing is still not an optional activity.</p><p>“The Sergeant asked me to look out for some specific triggers, things that show up in blood tests and such and I was entering this in and it flipped all the flags,” she says in a rush.</p><p>He lets out a slow even breath and opens the folder, Michael’s name standing out harshly against the white paper. He has no clue what he’s looking at, probably even Jesse would look at all this and have no clue, would take the nurse at face value.</p><p>“Who have you told about this?” he asks, he flips through the sheets that might as well hold gibberish for all that he understands it.</p><p>“No one,” she says, her voice carries an offended tone and he flicks his eyes up at her then back down at the folder. “No one, I did exactly what the Sergeant asked me to, I printed out the results and then went back in and changed them so no one else would see them. But he never answered when I tried the number he gave me to arrange the drop off.”</p><p>“The Sergeant is… indisposed at the moment,” Jim says carefully, he folds the folder closed then lets the hand holding it fall to his side.</p><p>“So what do we do?” she asks, “I mean we’re going to need to move him, right?”</p><p>Jim doesn’t blanche at the thought of Michael being locked in those cells that he just opened, but it’s a near thing.</p><p>“He’s a minor child, we’re going to treat him as a minor child while he’s still in the hospital’s care,” he says.</p><p>She nods, eyes still bright. He’s sure in her brain she’s rationalizing his decisions with and believes that as soon as he’s <i>released</i> from the hospital that he’ll be picked up and transported to Caulfield to be locked away like so many others.</p><p>No one will be locked back up in Caulfield ever if Jim can manage it.</p><p>“I trust I have your discretion on this matter?” he asks.</p><p>“Of course, sir,” she smiles brightly at him. “I’ll make sure that nothing that will force additional tests gets entered.”</p><p> </p>
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</div><p> </p><p>Mindy is curled up in a chair by Alex’s bed, hand resting against the side, not touching him.</p><p>“I sent him back to his room,” she says when she realizes that Jim is looking around the room for Michael. “He needs the rest.”</p><p>“So do you,” Jim says, he touches Alex’s arm, just to remind himself that the boy is alive, that he’s safe, that he’s <i>here</i>, that they haven’t <i>totally</i> failed him. “Have they said anything more?”</p><p>“Just,” Mindy folds her hand over Alex’s, squeezes his fingers and the despair in her eyes when Alex doesn’t squeeze back increases two-fold. “More tests, they’re worried about the swelling in his brain, they’re worried about some of his internal injuries.” Her voice shakes and cracks, when he looks over there’s tears streaming from her eyes.</p><p>“Mindy…”</p><p>“He meant to kill him, Jim,” she says softly. “If you hadn’t found him, Jesse meant for him to die out there, alone. Though he might still die here anyway.”</p><p>“He won’t die,” Jim shakes his head. “He won’t, Mimi and I we talked to…”</p><p>“And what do we have to give up in return?” she asks and Jim knows he’s not imagining the suspicious edge in her voice.</p><p>“Nothing that we probably wouldn’t have offered anyway, if they can help him and all we have to do is help them find some of their missing kin…” Jim doesn’t tell her that he’s pretty sure he’s already located one of those missing kids without even really trying.</p><p>He’s not sure if Michael is Nora’s missing son or the other boy, he does know that he’s definitely not the daughter, that much he can say for sure.</p><p> </p>
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</div><p> </p><p>He grabs a handful hours of sleep when he gets home. Sliding into bed beside Michelle and letting her curl into him and holding her tight to him.</p><p>He’d already checked, and Kyle was sound asleep in his room, surrounded by pictures and things that Jim remembers from Kyle and Alex as young boys.</p><p>He hadn’t thought that Kyle had kept any of those items, and the boys had been so young in the majority of those pictures. He could probably use them to pinpoint exactly when they stopped being friends.</p><p>When he wakes, he’s alone in the bed and the house is quiet which means everyone has gone off to start their day. Kyle should be in school, Michelle will be down at the station, he scrubs his hands over his face and sits up.</p><p>He checks his phone and there have been no calls, no emergency to try and yank his attention away from the situation at hand.</p><p>The situation that he tries to not think about as he showers and shaves and dresses for the day. When he walks into the kitchen to pour a cup of coffee, still trying to decide between toasting a bagel or stopping in the Crashdown for something quick to eat, he finds instead Mimi sitting at the table.</p><p>Two cups of coffee in front of her and a bag that a quick look into contains a breakfast sandwich.</p><p>“You look like shit,” she says and he rolls his eyes but sits in the seat across from her, popping the lid off his coffee and waiting for her nod before pulling the sandwich out. “Thought we could go through our game plan.”</p><p>“Might be a small hitch in our game plan,” he says, she raises an eyebrow at him and he finishes the sandwich off before standing up and going to retrieve his work bag.</p><p>He’s lucky that Michelle trusts him a bit more lately, months ago he couldn’t have kept anything in his work bag that he didn’t want his wife finding. He knows that’s all on him, he should have been honest with her about Helena from the beginning.</p><p>They’re going to be rebuilding that broken trust until the day he dies, might never get back to where they once were. And she doesn't even <i>know</i> about Rosa yet, he might end up alone at the end regardless.</p><p>The folder is still in there and he slides it across the table at Mimi. Her eyes go wide once she sees the tab with the name cross the top.</p><p>“Went back to the hospital to check on Alex and got accosted by a nurse when I went in,” he gestures towards the file. “Apparently Jesse has spies in a few more places then the ones we knew about.”</p><p>“What were they even looking for?” Mimi mutters and he’s gratified that she doesn’t seem to understand anything that files contains either.</p><p>“I’m going to guess Jesse or one of the Project Shepherd scientists developed a list of criteria to look for. I don’t know what any of the gibberish in there means, but Michael Guerin triggered one of his spies alarms and she couldn’t get hold of him so she’d apparently been given instructions to contact me if Jesse became unavailable.”</p><p>“Jesus, we need to move him…” Mimi starts and Jim shakes his head.</p><p>“I think removing him from the hospital is going to raise even more flags, especially once it becomes common knowledge that Jesse is in jail and that we’re not doing anything to mitigate the situation that found him put there.” He sips at his coffee and waves his hand at the folder that Mimi is still flipping through.</p><p>“That’s apparently the only copy of the real data, so we’ll have to hope she wasn’t lying to me. We should see if David or Nora know if any of their companions are psychic to some degree and can get into her head and maybe remove the knowledge of those.”</p><p>“You know we’re going to have to have something to offer them in return for that,” Mimi says absently.</p><p>Jim just looks at her and it takes a minute for Mimi to put the t’s together and finish dotting the I’s.</p><p>“You think Michael Guerin is one of their missing children,” she says slowly.</p><p>“I think even if he’s not he’s someone that they probably didn’t even know they needed to be looking for.”</p><p> </p>
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</div><p> </p><p>The station is buzzing when he gets there.</p><p>“They wouldn’t even let us call you,” Carla says in a whisper as she brushes by, he can see Michelle looking pale faced and grim over by her desk.</p><p>He doesn’t need to, but he still looks.</p><p>The cell that he had kept Jesse in is empty, bed not even in disarray to show evidence that he’d even been kept there. He takes several long deep breaths, trying to not let his anger bubble up to the surface and over. It’ll be of no help to anyone.</p><p>“Jim…” Michelle is behind him when he turns.</p><p>“Call Mindy, tell her to come in and file the paperwork for a restraining order,” he says. “And make sure the hospital knows that Jesse Manes is not to come anywhere near Alex or Michael.”</p><p> </p>
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<a name="section0008"><h2>8. Book 1: Chapter 8</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p><b>Legacies 8/?</b><br/>
<br/>
He meets Mimi in the parking lot at the hospital, he knows Mindy understands why she needs to file the order.</p><p>But he also knows that if he were in her shoes that he wouldn’t be leaving Alex alone in the hospital with no one but the over worked staff and an already injured Michael looking out for his best interests.</p><p>They’ll switch places and Mindy will go back to the station with Mimi to get the documentation in order and Jim will stand by Alex’s bedside while David tries to heal the worst of Alex’s injuries without healing <i>all</i> of Alex’s injuries.</p><p>“Can you do that?” Jim asks and David just raises an eyebrow at him as they all three walk through the hallways.</p><p>“I understand that discretion is needed while the Sergeant is still out there somewhere,” David says and Mimi nods, though that wasn’t really what Jim was getting at.</p><p>They just don’t need Alex to suddenly be the miraculously healed teen age boy, they’re going to have enough to deal with.</p><p>And he’s not worried about Jesse showing up out of nowhere, not yet anyway.</p><p>He’s sure wherever he is right now he’s being detained by the military police at least for the moment; in Jim’s most vivid nightmares he’ll probably only be in their custody for however long it takes for Jesse and the people above him pulling his strings to spin a dramatic tale as to <i>why</i> Jesse felt the need to assault two seventeen year old boys and why it was in their best interest that he do so.</p><p>“You do remember the terms of our agreement?” David asks quietly, Jim nods and doesn’t cast his eyes over to Mimi because he would have thought she would have said something.</p><p>“Yeah, of course,” Jim says, when they get to Alex’s closed door he pauses, hand just barely touching it as he gathers himself to see the extent of Alex’s injuries in the cold harsh light of daytime.</p><p>Mindy is already coming to her feet when Jim pushes it open, he’s surprised to see Michael there as well when he enters; blanket tucked around his legs looking pale even in the dim lighting.</p><p>He blinks at Jim and Jim <i>knows</i> he’s not imagining the widening of his good eye or the quick indrawn breath when David follows him in, Mimi trailing along behind, allowing the door to close behind her.</p><p>That’s one question resolved, which means that the other two missing children are likely the Evans twins since they’ve been attached to Michael’s side since he was admitted.</p><p>“Oh,” David breathes. “You didn’t say you’d thought you’d already found one of them.”</p><p>“We weren’t sure entirely and thought it unnecessarily cruel to say we had when there was just as good a chance as he wasn’t one of your missing children,” Mimi says soothingly.</p><p>“He was the other young one injured when the Sergeant…” David says slowly, realization suddenly dawning on him. Eyes flicking between Michael to where Alex is lying motionless and silent in the bed but for the equipment surrounding him.</p><p>Mindy presses her hand to Michael’s shoulder, squeezing gently.</p><p>David stays on the other side of Alex’s bed, though he allows his attention to be drawn to the figure there instead of Michael’s still one.</p><p>He presses a hand to Alex’s arm, the faint light emanating from it the only sign that he’s even <i>doing</i> anything.</p><p>“Just a brief diagnostic,” he says absently, eyes closed as he concentrates. “To see what we’re dealing with.”</p><p>“Apparently I think very loudly,” Jim says for Mindy’s benefit, he thinks Michael doesn’t need the explanation. Mindy manages a small smile in his direction, but he doesn’t think Michael is even aware he spoke.</p><p>He’s intently focused on David’s lightly glowing hand pressed to Alex’s arm.</p><p>Jim is fairly sure they won’t actually be able to tell visibly what David has or hasn’t done, but he would swear on his son’s life that Alex’s breathing sounds lighter.</p><p>“Just enough,” David says looking over at him and Jim nods.</p><p>“We don’t want to draw unwanted attention,” Jim says, he looks over at where Mindy is still standing, hand still on Michael’s shoulder. “I’ll stay here with him, you need to go with Mimi and make sure…”</p><p>“He’s getting near any of my boys ever again over my dead fucking body,” Mindy growls, Jim wonders where that desire was when Mindy walked away and left them with Jesse in the first place. He’s sure Jesse didn’t leave her many options, but Flint at least would have been old enough to decide.</p><p>Though he’s also sure that if there was a choice to be made, the choice had been made <i>for</i> them. There had probably never been any option of being allowed to remain with their mother.</p><p>“The paperwork will make sure that remains the case,” Jim says, “I’d rather not leave anything up to chance where he’s concerned though.”</p><p>“What about…” Mindy’s eyes flick towards where Michael’s casted hand is laying on the edge of Alex’s bed. He’s not touching him, Jim knows he’s acutely hyper aware of every single adult in the room with them right now.</p><p>And probably doesn’t really trust a single one of them to protect him or Alex at this point. Jim aims to change that, but he foresees a long battle in front of them.</p><p>“His case worker was supposed to be down at the station already filling out the necessary documentation, I believe the Evans’ are going to offer to house him once he’s released from the hospital,” from the surprised look on Michael’s face when he turns his head towards him, Jim doesn’t think that was actually known to the boy yet.</p><p>“If for some reason that falls through,” which is unlikely, Ann Evans has proven herself to be force of nature, he wouldn’t want to go up against her for any amount of money. “Well Michelle has reminded me we have the spare bedroom that could probably be used after a fair amount of dusting.”</p><p> </p>
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</div><p> </p><p>“You have your mother’s eyes,” David says softly, after they sit there in silence for longer then Jim thought they would.</p><p>Michael’s hand is still resting on the edge of Alex’s bed, though he’s scooted his wheelchair closer and is now just <i>barely</i> not touching the other boy.</p><p>“That would be Nora?” he asks and David nods once.</p><p>“You could have asked for a bigger boon if you’d said you’d already found them.”</p><p>Jim shakes his head, “my bigger favor is going to be asking if anyone in your group is capable of getting into someone’s head and removing stuff, information that someone should maybe not be privy to any longer?”</p><p>David looks at him, eyes narrowed, and lips pursed.</p><p>“I only really found out about him because Jesse has a spy in the hospital, she couldn’t get hold of him and he’d apparently given instructions that if he were to become unreachable, she should contact me.”</p><p>“I tried to leave,” Michael mutters, “the nurses had a hissy fit.”</p><p>“I think by then it was already too late, they would have taken bloodwork when you were first admitted, she gave me the file with your real data in it and exchanged it out for something that wouldn’t raise any flags. But I don’t like leaving her here with free range access to either Michael or Alex.”</p><p>“You think she would do them harm?” David asks, “she’s a healer is she not?”</p><p>“I don’t think that has anything to do with it, she thinks she’s protecting the planet from alien invaders…”</p><p>“He’s a child,” David states, “they’re <i>both</i> children.”</p><p>“I don’t think it really matters to her, or them,” Jim says, he leans back in his chair. Stares at the ceiling tiles for a moment before looking back over at David who is focused on Michael.</p><p>“You knew my mom?” Michael finally asks quietly, when Jim thinks the silence is getting oppressive and is contemplating the wisdom of leaving the two of them alone for five minutes and hunting down some coffee.</p><p>“Know,” David corrects, “I <i>know</i> your mother.”</p><p>When Jim looks at him Michael has an expression on his face that is probably the closest to hope that the boy has had in a long time.  There’s also an edge to his eye that screams that he’s waiting for it to be snatched away just as quickly as it was delivered to him.</p><p>“Her name is Nora,” David says, his smile is achingly gentle. Jim half feels like he’s interrupting something extremely private. “She’s going to be so very happy to see you.”</p><p> </p>
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</div><p> </p><p>“I don’t need to be in a room with her, I just need you to point her out so I know where I’m looking,” David says as Jim leads him through the hospital, “probably best that I’m not so if something lingers she’s not able to point a finger at either you or me.”</p><p>Jim nods, he finds her quick enough in the cafeteria, she’s sitting in a corner by herself, shoulders hunched as she holds a book in one hand and eats with the other.</p><p>He pauses in the doorway just long enough so he can jerk his head in her general direction before leading David away down to a family waiting area that is mostly emptied.</p><p>He paces in front of him as David sits down slowly, he doesn’t know how long it’ll take. He was never privy to any of the experiments that Jesse had forced upon those at Caulfield.</p><p>Better to ignore the human rights violations happening if they weren't happening right in front of his own eyes.</p><p>David doesn’t even close his eyes, though when Jim looks at him, he can tell that the other man is not mentally present. It takes just a few moments and David nods to himself then at him.</p><p>“Done?” he asks and David smoothly rises once more.</p><p>“She was planning on calling the Sergeant again after her shift, to make sure that he knew that she’d given the information to you and asking for follow up instructions. She did not like that you were allowing him to stay in the hospital with no guard.”</p><p>“I kind of figured that was going to be an issue,” Jim sighs, he rubs a hand over his forehead.</p><p>“She doesn’t remember the tests, when she attempts to contact him again she’s only going to inform him that a lab tech screwed up all the tests, they reran them all again and nothing was out of the ordinary. She even had them rerun independently and received back the same results.”</p><p>“I don’t really even like leaving her in the hospital with Alex and Michael,” Jim mutters.</p><p>“They have no reason to run more tests on Michael, and Alex will likely wake in the morning and start his very lengthy recovery process.”</p><p>“Still,” Jim says, he doesn’t like a known spy and ally of Jesse’s being in any sort of position that allows her to have fairly free access with the boys.</p><p>He’ll have to make sure he makes his concerns heard and point her out to Mindy so she knows to not allow the woman near either one of them.</p><p> </p>
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<a name="section0009"><h2>9. Book 1: Chapter 9</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <b>Legacies 9/?</b><br/>
</p><p>He gets the call from the school about five minutes after Mimi and Mindy arrive back at the hospital with a glowering Michelle in tow. He’s almost thankful for the phone call that pulls him out of Alex’s hospital room and away from three rightfully angry women.</p><p>“I’m sorry, could you repeat that?” he asks, Kyle doesn’t get into fights in school. At least not fights bad enough that the school is calling to ask him to come in.</p><p>He contemplates going back into the room and having Michelle deal with it, but that’s the coward’s way out and he’s not going to have Michelle or Mimi side eyeing him about this.</p><p>“I’ll be there in about fifteen minutes,” he says when he’s told again by a quiet voiced secretary that his son has been in an altercation and that he needs to come get him.</p><p>He probably should have said something to Michelle about keeping Kyle home until they knew more about Alex’s condition.</p><p>He takes the duration of the fifteen-minute ride to the high school to calm himself, so he doesn’t jump off the handle and berate his son in the middle of the high school for doing something so stupid as get into a fight weeks before graduation.</p><p>Kyle’s never seemed to care that much, but it would be just the thing that keeps him from being able to walk if he gets expelled for this.</p><p>He’s not even sure why he’s so confident that whatever happened is Kyle’s fault, but he is so he’s a bit taken aback when he gets to the front office and finds Kyle sitting to one side with Liz on one side of him looking grim and Max on the other side of him looking like he’s not <i>exactly</i> sure what he’s doing there and Maria sitting on the other side of Liz looking self-satisfied.</p><p>Kyle’s got an ice pack held up to his face, Max has one held to his jaw, Liz has a torn shirt and he thinks that is likely blood on Maria’s.</p><p>It stops him dead in his tracks and he can’t seem to do anything but just stare at them in bewilderment.</p><p>“What the ever loving…” he mutters and just barely manages to keep from swearing in front of a bunch of teenagers that <i>have</i> probably both said and heard worse so he’s not sure why he’s actually bothering to censor himself.</p><p>“She doesn’t have any more icepacks,” Isobel announces as she stalks back in.</p><p>“It’s a nurse’s office, how can…” Maria grumbles as she pushes herself to her feet, the heel is broken off one of her boots, so she wobbles a little before putting her hand on Liz’s shoulder to steady herself. “Oh hey, Sheriff,” she says noticing him standing there staring at them.</p><p>“Dad I can explain,” Kyle says, hand holding the icepack to his eye falling into his lap causing both Liz and Max to elbow him to put it back and Jim to wince at the black eye he’s going to inevitably end up with.</p><p>“The school said you were in a fight,” he says slowly and Kyle’s mouth twists.</p><p>“It was <i>not</i> his fault,” Isobel says, she sits in the empty chair to Max’s left, back straight, ankles crossed to the side.</p><p>“Good you’re here,” the Principal comes out of his office, “Ms. Evans I thought you were going to get more ice packs?”</p><p>“The nurse said she didn’t have any more ready, she’ll bring them once they are.”</p><p>“School will likely be done for the day by that point,” the Principal says, “Ms. Terwilliger can you check the cafeteria and see if they have any ice?”</p><p>“Yes sir,” the receptionist that hadn’t even stopped Jim to make him sign in nods and rushes away.</p><p>“Come on in, Sheriff,” the Principal says, holding the door open for Jim to enter.</p><p>“What’s happened?” he asks once the door has shut behind them, he glances back like he can see through the closed blinds to the waiting room where his son is surrounded by his ex-girlfriend, her best friend and two people that he would have yesterday been fairly confident were not actually <i>friends</i> with Kyle.</p><p>“How is young Mr. Manes doing? I called the hospital this morning but got a trite ‘condition unchanged’ which was not really revealing in any way. I’ve got grief counselors on call if it comes to it but this close to the end of the school year and graduation, I’m really hoping we don’t need to use them.”</p><p>“He’s not conscious yet, the doctors are hopeful that he will be soon but…”</p><p>“He never even talked to any of the counselors here, I know there were some rumors a few years back, but… you can’t make children talk if their parental figures tell them not to and scare them badly enough that what they’ll go home to if they do is worse then what they were doing before,” he sighs and Jim wishes he could sigh with him.</p><p>The school might not have been able to push the issue, but Jim knows <i>he</i> should have. That’s going to haunt him for a long time, he thinks.</p><p>“At least Mr. Guerin is recovering, but…”</p><p>“Why did I get a call that Kyle was in a fight?” Jim asks, trying to focus the direction on the kids that are sitting in the next room other than at the kids that are already safer than they were even days ago.</p><p>“This is all secondhand of course, the teachers only realized anything was wrong after it had already begun. But what we’ve managed to piece together is several of your son’s friends had some derogatory things to say about both Mr. Manes and Mr. Guerin, your son took exception and somehow Mr. Evans got dragged into it. The teachers broke it up but a few of the boys were still saying things of a decidedly horrific nature indicating that they believed the harm caused them was justified.”</p><p>“Jesus,” proof positive that he should have kept Kyle home, should have probably insisted that Mimi keep Maria home and should have sucked it up and called Arturo and maybe asked that he keep Liz home as well.</p><p>He would have thought since the Evan’s kids had been at the hospital for Michael that their mom would have kept them away as well, but he doesn’t know her well enough to have called her up.</p><p>Just to keep them from having to deal with the insensitivity of their classmates over things they probably don’t even fully comprehend.</p><p>“We’ve already expelled the other boys; their parents have been and gone with them.  They were none of them pleased, but I wanted to talk to you about Kyle before I released him and none of the others would leave.”</p><p>He drags his hands over his face and when he finally looks up the Principal is looking at him and in his hand is a small stack of cards.</p><p>“I think all of them would maybe benefit from some grief counseling, while this fight wasn’t their fault, they’re all of them in a very emotional state right now.”</p><p>“Grief counseling? Alex and Michael aren’t…” <i>dead</i>.</p><p>“No, but we don’t offer counseling just for student deaths, we offer it after any traumatic event, it might help them figure out how they feel, and give them some other, <i>healthier</i> avenues to channel their grief, anger and frustration into.”</p><p> </p>
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</div><p> </p><p>Kyle is still holding the ice pack to his eye when Jim takes him home, his knuckles white where he’s gripping the steering wheel.</p><p>“They were saying he deserved it,” Kyle says sullenly, “but they didn’t see him when you brought him in…”</p><p>There’s a red light and Jim takes the chance to glance over at where Kyle is slumped in his seat, he’s pale, bottom lip trembling, very obviously in distress.</p><p>It was easier when he was young, when he would allow or ask for comfort when he needed it, now he’s a teenager on the cusp of being an adult and showing those signs of weakness are not something that Jim ever expects to see anymore.</p><p>“He didn’t deserve that,” Kyle mutters.</p><p>“No one does,” Jim says softly.</p><p>“You said he was going to be okay, he’s still going to be okay, right? You would say if things were bad, if…”</p><p>“He’s not going to die,” Jim says, “He’s not… he might take some time to recover, but Alex is strong and healthy, and he’s not going to let his dad win this way.”</p><p>The laugh that startles a quick glance over shows that it appears to have startled Kyle as well.</p><p>“What’s going to happen to him? With his dad gone and his mom doesn’t even <i>live</i> here anymore, is she going to take him away?”</p><p>“I don’t think his mom is going to take him anywhere he doesn’t want to go.”</p><p>Kyle is silent for the rest of the trip home and when Jim pulls into the driveway, he sees Michelle’s car already parked there.</p><p>“Mom is going to be so mad,” Kyle groans.</p><p>“You were defending a friend, if she’s mad at anyone it won’t be you,” Jim says as he pushes the door open and steps out. He grabs Kyle'd backpack from the backseat and follows his son into the house.</p><p>“I didn’t know where you’d disappeared to so I didn’t know how long you were going to be, how about we just order something in…” Michelle is saying when she comes around the corner, there’s an edge to her voice that Jim hasn’t heard since right after she learned about Helena and Rosa and her trust in him was just about completely shattered.</p><p>“Mom…” Kyle starts to say.</p><p>“Dios mío, ¿qué te pasó en la cara?” she says rapidly, hands gentle on Kyle’s face as she pushes the ice pack away and presses fingers softly against the marks on his skin. “Jim?”</p><p>“Some boys at school were saying some decidedly vicious things about Alex and Michael and…” he waves a hand in Kyle’s direction, “Kyle didn’t take too kindly to their opinions on the whole thing.”</p><p> </p>
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<a name="section0010"><h2>10. Book 2: Chapter 10</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>POV change. :)</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <b>Legacies 10/?</b><br/>
</p><p>“He’s going to be fine,” Alex’s mom (call me Mindy) says when she sends him back to his room that night, he hates it.</p><p>Hates being out of sight of Alex, of knowing that the only thing standing between Alex and his dad is a door, some nurses and his mom.</p><p>His mom has already left him alone with his dad once, what’s to say she won’t do it again?</p><p>Though she’s here now, sitting by Alex’s bed and he’s rolled in a couple of times and found her brushing away tears, bottom lip trembling. Michael feels bad thinking about her abandoning Alex after he sees how upset she is with the condition he’s in now.</p><p>They’re lucky he was alive, that was the gist of what he got when the doctor was rattling off the list of Alex’s injuries to Alex’s mom seemingly not caring that there were teenagers just steps away.</p><p>He has hope now though, hope that he didn’t have that morning when he woke up, and he’s kind of excited for Max and Isobel to show up so he can tell them about David.</p><p>Tell them that they’re not alone here, that they <i>weren’t</i> abandoned by their families on an alien planet. That there’s David now and how David had talked about his mom in the present tense.</p><p>He talked about her like she was <i>alive</i> still.</p><p>They deliver his dinner to his room a couple of minutes after he’s back in his bed, TV turned on low to something he’s not going to watch but the room is too quiet without the hum of it. He’s just started eating when Max and Isobel come tumbling in, there’s a bruise blooming on Max’s chin and cheek.</p><p>“What the hell?” he asks, dropping his fork, he knows his eyes are wide and startled. Max makes a face and Isobel rolls her eyes as she sets the stack of books on the table to his left.</p><p>“It’s nothing,” Max mutters, he drops into the chair to the right of Michael’s bed.</p><p>“That doesn’t look like nothing,” Michael says, he looks over at where Isobel has her arms crossed over her chest and looks bemused.</p><p>“Couple of guys running their mouths at school,” Max says, he hunches forward in the chair and won’t meet Michael’s eyes. He looks back over at Isobel hoping for more information.</p><p>“So you thought you’d run into one of their fists? We’re like weeks from graduation.”</p><p>Isobel sighs like they’re both an extreme annoyance and Michael is just confused. Max isn’t a pacifist, but he definitely doesn’t go out looking for fights, if anything he tends to head in the opposite direction when they break out so he doesn’t get caught up in them.</p><p>“He was pulling one of them off Kyle and got elbowed in the jaw,” Isobel says as she drags the other chair over next to Max and sits down, Mrs. Evans pushes the door open and looks them over.</p><p>“I’m going to go see if Mindy needs anything, are you all okay in here?”</p><p>“There will be no further bruises,” Isobel smiles brightly, their mom rolls her eyes and the door closes quietly behind her as she leaves.</p><p>“Why was Valenti fighting in school?” Michael asks and he hates that he sounds bewildered, though he can’t possibly think of who Kyle Valenti would be fighting with. The last person he picked a fight with was Alex and Alex is in absolutely no shape to be that person.</p><p>Max makes a face, and almost impossibly hunches in even further on himself.</p><p>“His friends were being complete insensitive jack asses,” Isobel says, “they deserve the expulsion and if Max would have let me I would have made mush of whatever brain cells they had left, they would have been gibbering vegetables.”</p><p>“What the fuck?” he breathes.</p><p>“They said that Alex’s dad was right, that he should have <i>killed</i> Alex and no court would have convicted him and then they said…” Max presses his palms to his thighs, mouth twisting. “They said he should have done the same to you,” his eyes are wet when he looks at Michael.</p><p>Michael feels sick, he goes to school with these people, though for not much longer, but the thought that people who thought that about him, about <i>Alex</i> are people that he sat in the same classes with and walked the same hallways with…</p><p>It’s unfathomable.</p><p>“Kyle told them to shut their mouths and Matt kept talking, I think he thought if he kept saying the same crap over and over that Kyle would side with them and they’d all have a good laugh about it. But Kyle said they hadn’t seen Alex when he got brought to the hospital, or you and they should…”</p><p>“Kyle was defending Alex?” Michael wonders when he fell down the rabbit hole, just a few short weeks ago Kyle was in Alex’s face and now.</p><p>“And you by default,” Max confirms, the expression on his face looks as confused as Michael feels.</p><p>“I was talking to Liz and Maria about it while the nurse was giving you the icepacks and confirming that Kyle’s nose wasn’t broken, apparently they used to be like super close. Neither one of them are sure what they fought about or if they just grew apart once Kyle turned jock and Alex, well didn’t,” Isobel is looking at her nails, picking at something that is apparently underneath one of them.</p><p>When she looks up and sees them both staring at her she shrugs and even to Michael’s eyes it looks defensive.</p><p>“I thought we didn’t like Maria,” Michael says.</p><p>“I don’t have to like her to pump her for information,” Isobel says, “and if you’re going to date Alex Manes then that means that Liz and Maria and probably Kyle from the looks of things are going to end up in our circle of friends. We should at least know <i>something</i> about them.”</p><p>Michael grins at her, gratified and hopeful at the thought that Alex will wake up and might still want to have anything to do with him.</p><p> </p>
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</div><p> </p><p>He realizes after Mrs. Evans has come back to collect them and take them home that he never told them about David and he’s glancing through the list of assignments that Isobel had his teachers compile for him to do.</p><p>He thinks the teachers have mostly just given him busy work, likely to send Isobel on her way and probably also to keep his brain from atrophying from the doing nothing but staring at four walls in either his or Alex’s room.</p><p>He jots a note in the margin of the fresh unused notebook that Isobel had placed on top.</p><p>
  <i>Tell Max and Is about David and mom???</i>
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</div><p> </p><p>It’s always the same nurse that wakes him up in the morning, it’s only been a few days but they’ve established a routine where she bounces in with a wide smile and throws open his curtains while he grumbles and tries to pull the pillow over his head.</p><p>She lays out his morning meds, nods as one of the orderlies sets a tray on the bedside table and watches as he takes the meds and starts eating.</p><p>She always looks like she’s spilling state secrets when she tells him how Alex’s night went. Whether he had a good one or a bad one, though he never hears the words he wants to hear.</p><p>
  <i>He’s awake.</i>
</p><p>“He had a really good night last night, so they pulled him in for a battery of tests this morning, Mrs. Manes wants to know if she can sit with you while she waits for them to bring him back to his room,” she says.</p><p>She barely waits to see his nod before she’s off to retrieve Alex’s mom.</p><p>He doesn’t even consider saying no, Mindy Manes controls his access to Alex right now. If she decides that Michael isn’t good for him, if she decides this is all his fault, then she could refuse to allow him into Alex’s room.</p><p>When she pushes the door open she looks much more relaxed and calm then when he saw her the night before.</p><p>“He had a really good night,” she says, “I don’t know if it’s what David did or Alex not willing to give his father the satisfaction but…”</p><p>“Alex is a fighter,” Michael says, though he doesn’t think she needs the reminder. “But I don’t think that David hurt anything either.”</p><p>She sits there in the chair silently flipping through the magazine she brought with her while Michael takes the pills that won’t do much for him and finishes his breakfast, she doesn’t look up so he reaches over to the stack of books that Isobel brought for him.</p><p>Flipping through the assignments that are likely meant to carry him through his convalescence  and up to graduation; but he’ll have finished by that night if Alex doesn’t wake up during the day and Michael is once more sent back to his room to be bored out of his mind.</p><p>“What are your plans after high school?” Mindy asks, dropping the magazine on the floor and folding her hands together in her lap.</p><p>“I got a scholarship so it was supposed to be college,” he says, though he looks down at his bandaged hand and winces, he might have to look at what deferring is going to cost him. Find out if he’ll lose his scholarship or…</p><p>“Most of your first semester is going to be filled with mandatory everyone has to take these classes,” she says. “You should be fine; Alex had mentioned that he had applied at a couple but I could never get him to tell me what his plans were. If I know Jesse at all college wasn’t in his plans for him.”</p><p>“You think his dad would have made him go into the military?” Michael says, he can’t even picture it. Alex with his black nail polish and nose ring and floppy hair and eye liner would have hated it. He can’t see any point where Alex would have agreed that was a good path for him to head down, not without his dad laying something over his head.</p><p>“I think Jesse isn’t going to be making those decisions for our son any longer,” Mindy says decisively. “He’s not going to be making those decision for <i>any</i> of our sons, not ever again.”</p><p> </p>
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</div><p> </p><p>Alex is wheeled back into his room in the early afternoon, still and quiet on his bed which is gratifying because it means he didn’t wake up while the doctors were doing whatever tests they deemed necessary.</p><p>They pull his mom outside the room, leaving Michael in his wheelchair beside the bed. He’s spent two hours talking to Mindy and she’s asked him question after question that leads Michael to believe that she’s studying his suitability as a prospective partner for her youngest son.</p><p>“You probably know this already,” Michael says as he leans forward, he wraps the fingers of his good hand around Alex’s and squeezes lightly. “But your mom can be kind of scary when she wants to be.”</p><p>He stares at the hand wrapped up tightly, he can barely see the tips of his swollen fingers, they don’t hurt though, just feel numb, which the doctors had told him to expect. They mentioned the possibility of a second and maybe a third surgery.</p><p>Michael is hopeful that he can regain enough movement that it won’t look suspicious if David or Max heals him up at some point in the future.</p><p>He’s just sitting there, staring at the bandages, biting at his lower lip and not really trying to figure out how to ask for that type of help when he feels the pressure on his other hand.</p><p>The one that he has wrapped around Alex’s.</p><p>He looks at where Alex’s fingers are flexing against his, just the gentlest, little brush of movement and he looks up at Alex’s face.</p><p>Still bruised and swollen but his eyes are peeking just the tiniest bit open and Michael can feel tears on his cheek as he leans forward, touches his thumb to Alex’s bottom lip and ignores the machines screeching and the door flying open.</p><p>“Hi,” he murmurs, and he can feel Alex’s lips curve into the tiniest bit of a smile as his eyes slip closed again.</p>
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<a name="section0011"><h2>11. Book 2: Chapter 11</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <b>Legacies 11/?</b><br/>
</p><p>The doctors and nurses don’t make him leave, Michael wonders if there’s something written on his face indicating that he is going absolutely <i>nowhere</i> now that Alex is awake.</p><p>Alex’s mom is a steady presence behind him, one hand curved around his shoulder. She’s not making any noise and there’s been no sign of confusion on Alex’s face at the sight of his mom standing there in those brief moments when he opens his eyes and barely twists his head to meet Michael’s eyes.</p><p>Michael wonders if there’s been times where Alex has woken when they were sleeping and not there to see him blink slowly at them.</p><p>The doctors and nurses run through their tests and questions, nudging Alex awake and into responding to them and he only really falters when one of the doctors asks if he knows why he’s in the hospital.</p><p>Alex freezes, eyes going wide and flickering with barely suppressed fear as he looks from each of the doctors and nurses faces, to where Michael is in the wheel chair and his mom behind him and then over at the door like he’s expecting his dad to be looming there like some horror movie villain.</p><p>The monitors still hooked up to him are screaming and he’s trembling so badly that Michael can <i>see</i> him.</p><p>“It’s okay,” Mindy is by Alex’s bed, shoving a nurse gently out of the way and laying a hand on Alex’s arm, the other cupping his face. “You’re okay, you’re safe, he can’t get to you anymore,” she says in a low soothing voice.</p><p>Alex looks over at him and Michael tries to make himself appear less battered then he is, it probably doesn’t work. The bandages around his hand and arm are hard to miss, as are the other injuries that Jesse Manes left him with.</p><p>They’ll all heal though, every single one of those marks that Jesse Manes left on his skin will heal and so will the ones that Alex has.</p><p> </p>
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</div><p> </p><p>He gets booted back to his room when night comes and Alex’s mom and the night nurse both insist that he needs to sleep in his own bed and not slumped over in the wheelchair.</p><p>He’d somehow even managed to eat his dinner in the room with Alex though Alex had only managed two small sips of the bland broth before he’d fallen back to sleep.</p><p>He’s just barely gotten himself settled in his bed, glancing over at the pile of books and contemplating just finishing up the packet of assignments so Isobel can take it back to hand in, when Max and Isobel barrel in.</p><p>“Alex is awake?” Isobel asks with a measure of excitement that he’s pretty sure he’s only heard in relation to shopping or some other inane activity that he has no interest in.</p><p>“How…” he starts and Max shakes his head.</p><p>“We’d met up with Kyle, Liz and Maria at the Crashdown and Kyle got a call from the Sheriff who must have gotten a call from the hospital…”</p><p>“Wait, is this a thing now?” Michael asks and he’s sure they can hear the bafflement in his voice. He’s not trying to hide it anyway, “we’re friends with Valenti and Liz and Maria now?”</p><p>“Well how else are we going to get any good information on Alex?” Isobel says sensibly, like it should be just basic common sense. He’s sure in her mind it does make sense, he really doesn’t want her to explain it to him in her ‘talking to idiots’ voice though so when she looks over, mouth open to do just that he holds up his not bandaged hand to stop her.</p><p>“He’s not that bad when he’s not around the others,” Max mutters, he seems annoyed by that fact.</p><p>“Yes, Alex is awake,” he confirms and Isobel smiles widely, even Max seems to relax a little.</p><p>Michael knows that even though they never talked about it, that Max has been probably silently weighing the pros and cons of <i>trying</i> to heal Alex in his mind.</p><p>The fear of discovery probably winning out over Alex actually dying most times.</p><p>Thankfully it’s not an issue and Michael grins, because he didn’t even <i>need</i> the note to remind himself.</p><p>“We’re not alone,” he says in a hushed voice, he glances at the doors and the windows and they all remained closed, no one bursting through to arrest them for being <i>actual</i> illegal aliens.</p><p>“You’re supposed to be sleeping, not watching X-Files reruns,” Isobel says with a sigh, mouth twisting in disapproval.</p><p>“Do they even show those on TV anymore?” Max asks, leaning back in his chair.</p><p>“No,” Michael says, shaking his head.</p><p>They don’t understand, which he gets, he does, but… “<i>we’re</i> not alone here,” he says and he stares at one then the other of them until there’s at least dawning realization on Isobel’s face.</p><p>He tells them about David, about the Sheriff and Mimi bringing him to Alex’s room, to the Sheriff seemingly already <i>knowing</i> that Michael wasn’t human and not doing anything about it.</p><p>“The Sheriff knows?” Isobel asks, there’s alarm written into every stiff muscle in her body as well as her wide eyes, Michael doesn’t have to look over to know that it’s likely mirrored on Max’s face and body as well.</p><p>“Kind of sounded like he and Mimi maybe broke them out of wherever they were being held?” Michael says, he rubs at his forehead with his bandaged hand then winces.</p><p>He’s not actually sure, but just what little bit he’d been able to piece together with throwaway comments by David and the Sheriff, then Mimi and Mindy once they’d returned that was what he was able to glean.</p><p>But it means that there’s a lot more to the Sheriff and Maria’s mom then what is shown to the general public.</p><p>Tries not to wonder what that means for Kyle and Maria, what it means for Alex. Because if the Sheriff and Mimi were in on that, chances were that Alex’s dad was as well.</p><p>“He said he knew my mom,” Michael says softly, “<i>knows</i> my mom,” he corrects himself. Because its present tense like David corrected him, he’d thought for years that he had no family save for Max and Isobel and he kind of doesn’t know what to do with the idea of his mom being <i>alive</i> out there.</p><p>There’s a giddy sense of relief but also an almost overwhelming amount of fear and nervousness warring with it.</p><p>What if she doesn’t like him?</p><p>What if she takes one look at him and decides he’s not worth the trouble and…</p><p>“Stop that,” Isobel says, squeezing his arm tightly. “Stop that line of thinking right now.”</p><p>“What if she hates me,” he says, he looks at his bandaged hand that is proof that not only couldn’t he protect Alex, he couldn’t even protect himself. What good is he if he can’t protect himself or the people he cares about?</p><p>“She’s not going to hate you,” Max says firmly. He feels kind of bad that he hadn’t thought to ask about Max and Isobel’s families, if one of their parents are with his mom.</p><p>When David comes back he’ll ask, or maybe Max and Is will still be in his room and they can see that he isn’t going nuts and ask him themselves.</p><p>“They said he’s sleeping,” Kyle says, pushing the door to his room open and looking all sorts of disgruntled at being denied the opportunity to see Alex awake. “But he didn’t look like he was sleeping, plus he’s never slept that hard ever, not in the whole time I’ve known him, I couldn’t open the tent at night when we went camping because the zipper would wake him up.”</p><p>“Wow,” Michael says when Kyle looks over at him and he finally gets a good look at Kyle’s face.  Proof that he really <i>was</i> in a fight and that it was over defending Alex and by extension Michael.</p><p>Ignoring the fact that Alex and Kyle were once good enough friends that they went <i>camping</i> together.</p><p>“Yeah,” Kyle winces, touches the side of his face. “My mom is pissed, probably still going to be bruised for graduation.”</p><p>“Little bit of makeup will cover that right up,” Isobel says with a bright smile. Kyle makes a face at the suggestion but doesn’t say no.</p><p>“I thought Liz and Maria went with you?” Max says when the door remains closed behind Kyle.</p><p>“They were, are, Liz’s dad came in and dragged my dad off, something about Rosa, so Liz and Maria went to try and eavesdrop on them.”</p><p>“And we’re apparently losing our touch, because we were completely unsuccessful,” Maria says, hand wrapped around Liz’s arm, the sound of them coming in doesn’t distract Michael from noticing the way that Isobel twitches at the sound of Rosa’s name.</p><p>Something to ask about later, he knows they’re friends, but Isobel is very closemouthed about anything to do with Rosa.</p><p>“They actually left the hospital,” Liz says, “so it’s not something that we could do anything about.”</p><p>“There are way too many people in this room,” the night nurse says as she pushes the door open with his nightly pills and a bottle of water on a tray.</p><p>They all look between each other and Michael’s not going anywhere since it’s his room and the nurses are hyper vigilant on him being in the wheelchair unless he’s doing his three times a day walk of the corridors to prove that he’s still mobile and <i>could</i> actually walk out of the hospital of his own accord if he needed to.</p><p>Right now Alex is still here, so Michael isn’t pushing to leave any sooner then he absolutely has to.</p><p>“I’m going to go see if maybe my mom knows anything,” Maria says, she’s already tugging Liz behind her.</p><p>“I’ll go with you,” Isobel announces, and Michael almost laughs at the wide startled expression on Maria’s face.</p><p>Kyle stands there, awkwardly shifting back and forth and Michael looks from him to where Max is leaning forward in his chair.</p><p>He doesn’t have the energy or the desire to deal with any of whatever is going on, so he twists the cap off the water, pours the pills that won’t do anything into his hand and takes them one a time, the night nurse nods approvingly.</p><p>“Visiting hours are over in 45 minutes,” she says and both Max and Kyle nod, both looking clean faced and innocent, not at all like ruffians that apparently get into fights at school.</p><p>She huffs and raises an eyebrow like she can see right through their innocent facades. And maybe she can.</p><p>“You probably got to talk to him,” Kyle mutters and Michael almost wants to grin at the annoyance lining every syllable that Kyle manages to get out.</p><p>“Well they are boyfriends, it’s probably only right that Michael should be there when he woke up,” Max says knowingly and Michael turns his head to look at him, Max has an earnest smile on his face directed completely at Kyle.</p><p>“I want to know how the gossip train at school can manage to peg Carly Delgado as knocked up before her boyfriend even knows yet not a single person knew about the two of them until…” Kyle waves a hand to encompass the shit storm that has likely been the last couple of days.</p><p>“It’s new,” Michael says and both Kyle and Max look at him with wide eyes and Michael doesn’t think he can take the sympathy on Max’s face or the dawning realization on Kyle’s.</p><p>He’s hopeful, that if he tries hard enough, maybe he can fake passing out in fifteen minutes or less.</p><p> </p>
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<a name="section0012"><h2>12. Book 2: Chapter 12</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <b>Legacies 12/?</b><br/>
</p>
<p>By 10 am Michael is pretty much done with the entire day.</p>
<p>He’s woken at 7am by a bright cheerful nurse who doesn’t seem to care that he really doesn’t <i>want</i> to be awake.</p>
<p>He then gets to meet with his doctor, who takes x-rays of his hand and is also cheerful about the reduction in swelling and how well things are looking only days the first surgery.</p>
<p>“You might not even need a second surgery,” he says and there had never going to be a need for a second surgery if Michael could help it. They’re already walking a razor thin line that ends up with them being exposed, he’s not going to be the thing that finally tips it over.</p>
<p>His case worker had been a quiet presence in the room while the doctor had been chattering at him, and then she finally gets <i>her</i> chance to be cheerful at him.</p>
<p>“So you’re going to be released from the hospital into Sheriff and Mrs. Valenti’s care…” she starts and completely ignores Michael shaking his head in denial.</p>
<p>There is no way in any universe that is a good idea.</p>
<p>Not at all.</p>
<p>“I’m going to be eighteen…” he’d tried.</p>
<p>“You’re still in school and frankly you need someone who’s going to look after you while you finish healing up,” she’d brushed him off, like she didn’t look like she was <i>maybe</i> an hour older than him if he was being generous.</p>
<p>So he was done with the day and the only thing that made it even a little better was at 10 am when he wheeled into Alex’s room under his own power there was no one in the room.</p>
<p>Alex’s eyes were closed, though the monitors still hooked up to him were steady and not screaming, there looked to be less of them but that also might be wishful thinking on his part.</p>
<p>He’s got the stack of books that Isobel had brought him from the school in his lap and his pulls the table that Alex isn’t using closer to him, twisting the knobs to lower it so he can set the books on it and sort through them. Trying to decide which ones he wants to get out of the way first.</p>
<p>“You can’t possibly be doing homework,” he hears muttered and when he looks up Alex’s eyes are just barely open.</p>
<p>“Hey,” he says and he slides the table away and maneuvers the wheelchair closer to the bed, leaning a bit forward so he can wrap his good hand around Alex’s wrist. He can feel the slow steady thump of his pulse against the pads of his fingers.</p>
<p>He leaves his hand there, just staring at him while Alex blinks slowly at him, when he goes to lift his arm up Michael links their hands together, brushing his lips against the back of Alex’s hand, then laying his cheek there.</p>
<p>Alex’s mouth curves a bit, into the barest idea of a smile and his thumb brushes against Michael’s skin.</p>
<p>He wants to risk the wrath of the nurses and doctors and Alex’s mom and climb into the bed, curl himself around Alex and hold him tight.</p>
<p>He’d be willing to do that, willing to take the yelling and probably banishment from Alex’s room; but Michael only has a bandaged hand and a bandage over his eye and some bruises and cuts…</p>
<p>Alex looks like he came out the other side of a war and even with David’s healing, he’s still one big mess of bruises and cuts and…</p>
<p>“I’m okay,” Alex says, his voice is raspy and low and he coughs once he gets the two words out. Michael wonders how bad <i>he</i> really looks if Alex is trying to reassure him.</p>
<p>Michael smiles at him, gratified when Alex returns it, eyes still barely slitted open but soft and fond nonetheless.</p>
<p>“<i>We’re</i> okay,” Michael corrects him, because he thinks it needs to be said. That they went through hell but they both made it out the other side.</p>
<p>And they’re together, he’s going to fight tooth and nail and Jesse Manes in order to keep it that way.</p>
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<p>The nurses don’t kick him out when they come in to do their hourly checks, just move around him and ask Alex the same five questions each time.</p>
<p>Alex closes his eyes periodically in the quiet and Michael flips through his homework, finishing up one packet, then another and when he looks up after finishing off the third one Alex is watching him.</p>
<p>“Are you really working on homework?” he asks, voice still raspy and Michael can see the ring of bruises around Alex’s neck that if he looks closely enough, he’s sure he’ll be able to identify as fingers and hands. He swallows past the horror of how close Alex came to actually dying at his father’s hands.</p>
<p>“I think it’s just busy work,” he says, when he realizes that Alex is laying there staring at him waiting for an answer.</p>
<p>“But you’re doing it? I don’t think you need any additional extra credit; didn’t you max out most of your classes already?”</p>
<p>Michael shrugs, tapping the eraser end of the pencil against the pad of paper.</p>
<p>“There’s only so much watchable TV,” Michael shrugs, tapping the eraser end of the pencil against the book he’d already closed. “And I was bored so…”</p>
<p>Alex stretches his arm out, waggling his fingers at him until Michael pushes the table away and wheels closer. Linking their fingers and kissing the back of his hand, squeezing tightly as a reminder that he’s there, that Alex is there, that they are <i>together</i>.</p>
<p>“Where’s my mom?” Alex asks, “she was here earlier, right? I didn’t dream that or…”</p>
<p>“No, she’s here, somewhere,” Michael shakes his head. “Not sure where she is this morning, there was no one in here after I managed to escape from my doctor and caseworker,” he wrinkles his nose but doesn’t hide the sigh. “Apparently I’m going to stay with the Valenti’s when they release me.”</p>
<p>Alex doesn’t say anything and when Michael looks up, expecting to see that Alex has fallen asleep mid conversation again he instead finds him gaping at him in incomprehension.</p>
<p>“Wh… how long was I unconscious <i>for</i>?” Alex asks, sounding just as bewildered as Michael feels about the whole thing. “I can’t imagine that Kyle is happy about that, I can…”</p>
<p>“Apparently it was him and the Sheriff, and they somehow talked his mom into it,” Michael shrugs, he just, before all this he doesn’t even know if he had spoken ten words to Kyle. Maybe in passing, or in class.</p>
<p>Michael has spent a while hating Kyle because of his douchebag behavior in school and how he’s treated Alex in the past.</p>
<p>It’s hard to reconcile <i>that</i> guy as being the same person that was poking fun at him with Max the night before or apparently gets in fights at school to defend Alex’s right to be with whoever he wanted.</p>
<p>“Is he a pod person?” Alex asks, voice all serious and low. “You know how to check for that right?”</p>
<p>“Is who a pod person?” the person in question pushes the door open, when Michael twists in the chair he is unsurprised to see Max right behind him, he is surprised to not see Isobel trailing after them.</p>
<p>“What the fuck?” Alex breathes and Michael winces, the bruising on Kyle’s face is starkly evident as is the one along Max’s jaw line.</p>
<p>They <i>look</i> like they were in a vicious fight, which they were. But they <i>look</i> like they lost that fight and Michael thinks the fact that they weren’t expelled means they actually won it.</p>
<p>“It looks bad, doesn’t it, my mom is so mad,” Kyle says, he goes to reach a hand up, likely to press his fingers against it but stops when Max elbows him the arm.</p>
<p>“What…” Alex blinks, he looks at Michael like Michael has any clue what is happening.</p>
<p>He doesn’t.</p>
<p>“Did you get in a fight with each other?” he asks and he looks back and forth between Kyle and Max, probably searching for a sign that one or both of them are there under duress.</p>
<p>Even to Michael’s admittedly untrained eye all he can see is two guys that are friends and he’s not even sure how <i>that</i> happened so fast. It’s been literal days, and he would have thought it safe to put money down on them <i>never</i> being able to be any sort of friend.</p>
<p>And not just because of how Kyle and his buddies had treated the rest of the school; but mostly because Kyle used to date Liz and Max <i>wanted</i> to date Liz.</p>
<p>“I’m sorry,” Kyle blurts out, when Michael looks at him he’s red faced, but he looks half shamed and half embarrassed, he’s not looking at anyone but Alex.</p>
<p>“I’m…” Alex starts and stops, he looks over at Michael with confusion written into every line of his face.</p>
<p>“I’m sorry, I was a complete dick and you don’t have any reason to believe me,” Kyle’s voice is soft and thick, <i>he</i> sounds like he’s maybe trying to not cry and he’s got his hands twisted together. Michael doesn’t know what to do with this guy.</p>
<p>“They got into a fight at school with those buddies of Kyle’s…” Michael starts.</p>
<p>“They’re not my friends, not anymore,” Kyle shakes his head, “I probably can count the number of people still talking to me on one hand.”</p>
<p>“Maria, Liz, Is, me,” Max says, holding up a hand, ticking off names with his fingers. “Michael, Alex, you’ve at least got two hands worth of people talking to you.”</p>
<p>“I don’t know if I want to be included on that list,” Michael mutters but when he looks over at Alex he can see him staring at Kyle and knows that Alex’s big heart is going to have him forgiving Kyle far faster then Michael wants him to.</p>
<p>There should be an excessive amount of groveling and crying and begging for just the stuff that Michael <i>knows</i> about that Kyle and his buddies put Alex through.</p>
<p>“I should have made my dad do something,” Kyle says. “Or my mom, but my mom probably would have just shot your dad in the head and…”</p>
<p>“I told you it was okay, I told you not to worry about it,” Alex says quietly, Kyle looks distressed, Alex looks pale and there’s an expression on Max’s face that Michael thinks might be mirrored on his.</p>
<p>He’d known just from the brief conversations he had to have with Kyle over the last day or so that the two of them used to be friends. He thinks he might have underestimated what type of friends they were though.</p>
<p>He’d kind of thought they were like acquaintance friends because their dads were friends, but he thinks that instead they’re more like him and Max then he’d care to admit to… more <i>brothers</i> then friends.</p>
<p>The betrayal of that bond of brotherhood probably hurt Alex more then the loss of friendship did.</p>
<p>“Fuck,” he mutters under his breath, but the room is silent save for the sounds from the equipment still hooked up to Alex.</p>
<p>Alex looks at him in askance and Michael sighs heavily.</p>
<p>“I’m going to have to be friends with him now, aren’t I?”</p>
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<a name="section0013"><h2>13. Book 2: Chapter 13</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <b>Legacies 13/?</b><br/>
</p><p> </p><p>Alex falls asleep right after they manage dinner and he gets medicated by one of the nurses; Max and Kyle have already disappeared to god knows where.</p><p>Michael wouldn’t care but he’s also half terrified that they’re out there bonding some more. The last thing they need is more bonding time between them, and he’s trying not to think about where Liz falls into this new ‘friendship’ that seems to have sprung up out of nowhere between them.</p><p>Kyle dated her, Max has been pining for her and he hasn’t seen her interact with either of them for an extended period of time yet, but he can’t imagine she’s okay with her ex-boyfriend and maybe prospective new boyfriend buddying it up.</p><p>Though none of the girls has been around, maybe she hasn’t realized yet that Max and Kyle are on their way to being fast friends?</p><p>Alex’s mom comes bustling in after Alex has been passed out for about thirty minutes, she’s been in and out, never staying for more then a few minutes at a time. Just checking that Alex is still in the bed and breathing, that he’s not alone and then rushing back out.</p><p>She looks harried and distracted and Michael kind of doesn’t want to know but really <i>does</i> want to know what’s going on.</p><p>“I had to dance through some hoops and figure out how to get the military to send notification off to them,” she says when she notices Michael glancing at her. “I certainly don’t want Jesse contacting them and spinning his web of lies.”</p><p>“You couldn’t just call them?” Michael asks and Mindy shakes her head.</p><p>“Clay and Gregory are both deployed, the only one I got to <i>actually</i> talk to was Flint but he spent more time telling me that his dad wouldn’t hurt Alex when I could walk right back into this room and see the proof that he <i>would</i>,” Mindy sounds annoyed and just the tiniest bit disheartened.</p><p>“Flint idolizes dad,” Alex says softly, his eyes are barely open, he’s not even really awake but his mom’s expression brightens at him being conscious while she’s in the room.</p><p>She perches on the edge of the bed, cupping a hand around the side of Alex’s head, her smile is bright and Michael looks away for a moment because there’s tears in her eyes and he’s never known what to do when an adult cries.</p><p>“I thought I dreamt you,” Alex mumbles, his eyes are already closed again.</p><p>“No, I’m here baby,” she says quietly, ghosting her fingers across the bruises on his face, his nose wrinkles, “I’m here, I’m not going anywhere again.”</p><p> </p>
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</div><p> </p><p>Michael goes back to his room under his own power when the sky is totally dark and he’s kind of surprised no one dragged him off against his will.</p><p>He kind of wishes he was still in Alex’s room when he wheels in and finds Max sprawled in one chair, Kyle kicked back in a different one and they’re just sitting there, in silence. Neither one saying a word, Max doesn’t even have a book out.</p><p>“Don’t you guys have anywhere else to be?” Michael asks as he transfers himself totally on his own from the wheelchair into his bed, it only hurts the tiniest bit and he wonders if he asks nicely if the Sheriff will bring David back and let him heal him up.</p><p>If only so he can stop being confined to the wheelchair and be in a better position to protect Alex; he doesn’t put it past Alex’s dad to try and pull something in the hospital and while Alex’s mom is spitting mad and he’d happily put money down on her coming out on top in a fight between Alex’s parents.</p><p>He also doesn’t think it should be totally up to her to protect Alex while Alex can’t protect himself.</p><p>“I’m supposed to be at Seth’s big party,” Kyle says, he’s staring at the ceiling, from this angle Michael can’t even see the bruises on his face, not until Kyle looks at him and then they’re in prominent display. They actually look <i>worse</i> then they had just a few hours prior.</p><p>“It’s probably for the best that you’re not,” Max says sagely, Michael can see Kyle’s eyeroll and bites back a laugh.</p><p>“My mom is already spitting mad enough,” he says, “she would totally figure out a way to convince my dad to ground me.”</p><p>“But the fight wasn’t your fault?” Michael asks, because he could have sworn that was what Max had said.</p><p>“No, I think she’s mostly mad at herself because dad thinks they should have kept me home, that I wasn’t in the right ‘mental head space’ to be dealing with a bunch of insensitive teenagers and she agrees with him,” Michael can hear the finger quotes <i>and</i> the sarcasm in Kyle’s voice.</p><p>“They couldn’t have known that was going to happen.”</p><p>Kyle shrugs, like the decisions and whims of parents are incomprehensible.</p><p>Which they are.</p><p>“Supposedly I’m staying with you when they boot me from the hospital?” Michael asks, Max cocks his head in surprise when Kyle nods.</p><p>“They were talking about it last night, then mom said she’d make the calls this morning. Dad and I are supposed to be cleaning out the guestroom this weekend to get it ready, we’ll have to share a bathroom though, sorry,” Kyle looks over at him and shrugs.</p><p>Like Michael cares about the bathroom, <i>having</i> a bathroom that he can keep a toothbrush in is almost a novelty at this point.</p><p>“You’re okay with this?” Michael asks in disbelief.</p><p>“I mean you’re not the baby sister that I was asking my folks for, but I kind of gave up on getting one of those years ago,” Kyle sounds kind of resigned to that fact.</p><p>“Have you guys just been hanging out in here?”</p><p>“We went to the cafeteria and had some questionable meatloaf,” Max says.</p><p>“It wasn’t meatloaf,” Kyle interjects, “I don’t know <i>what</i> that was, but it was <i>not</i> meatloaf.”</p><p>“The board said it was meatloaf,” Max rolls his eyes and Kyle snorts.</p><p>“The board was a lying liar then.”</p><p>Michael looks back and forth between then, it’s been a literal day and there’s already a quiet familiarity between them. Max is relaxed and joking like he would with him or Isobel and Michael has never interacted with a version of Kyle that was not acting like some douchebag jock.</p><p><i>This</i> Kyle he might actually be able to be friends with, even without Alex being in the picture. Though Alex is in the picture, and if Michael has any say in the matter will be for the rest of time.</p><p>He’s opening his mouth, to say what he’s not sure, but he’s cut off by the door being pushed opened violently and Liz is stumbling into the room. Maria and Isobel behind her, Liz has tears streaming down her face and Maria seems to be actually holding Isobel up.</p><p>Both Max and Kyle are on their feet though neither one of them make it the few steps before Liz is on her knees.</p><p>Michael can see the indecision on Max’s face and then the looks between him and Kyle that has Kyle going to his knees in front of Liz and Max going to Isobel.</p><p>Michael doesn’t move, he’s not actually sure what’s going on, this has nothing to do with Alex, he is confident that he would <i>know</i> if this had something to do with Alex.</p><p>“Rosa,” Liz is sobbing into Kyle’s neck. “Rosa.”</p><p> </p>
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</div><p> </p><p>The story comes out in bit and pieces, little chunks between Liz and Maria’s breakdowns and Isobel sitting there in what Michael can only classify as shock.</p><p>Had Isobel even <i>known</i> Rosa? Michael asks the questions with his eyes and Max shakes his head and shrugs.</p><p>She’s still alive is the most important thing, though it sounds like she very nearly wasn’t. Jasmine, who Michael doesn't even know, wasn't as lucky it seems.</p><p>“The Sheriff doesn't know what happened, he thinks that maybe whoever it was got scared off by something,” Maria says numbly, Michael thinks she might be in shock, she’s sitting on the floor near where Kyle has Liz wrapped up in his arms and covers her face with her hands. He can hear the hitching sounds of her crying.</p><p>“My dad was there?” Kyle asks, he rubs a hand down Liz’s arm and she doesn’t react. Just stares blankly at Michael’s door, like she’s expecting someone, maybe Rosa, to come waltzing through cackling about a practical joke.</p><p>“My dad was worried about Rosa, she didn’t come home the last couple of nights and,” Liz’s voice breaks, “he went to your dad and asked for help finding her, I think they thought…”</p><p>“She didn’t relapse,” Isobel says fiercely, Liz looks over at her and even Maria lowers her hands and stares at her through tear swollen eyes. “She was clean, she was fine, she wouldn’t,” Isobel insists, before her expression just blanks out and she crumples against Max’s side, head hanging low silent tears streaming from her eyes.</p><p>“It was you,” Maria says slowly, when Michael looks at her, he can see a dawning realization on her face. Like something has just been confirmed that Maria hadn’t known about before. “You were the girl she was seeing that she wouldn’t tell me about.”</p><p> </p>
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<a name="section0014"><h2>14. Book 2: Chapter 14</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <b>Legacies 14/?</b><br/>
</p><p> </p><p>Michael doesn’t know what to do with this new knowledge about Isobel and Rosa, he’s at least gratified that Max seems to be as bewildered by this news as he is.</p><p>Which is surprising strictly because Max and Isobel have always seemed to be joined at the brain, the fact that <i>he</i> didn’t know about them means Isobel was working at keeping them from finding out.</p><p>Liz manages to compose herself enough to drag Maria off to see if she can find out what Rosa’s condition is, Max takes Isobel by the hand and follows after them.</p><p>Kyle stays in his room, slouching in a chair and staring at the door.</p><p>“You could just go with them,” Michael says, he doesn’t need a babysitter, especially not if the babysitter is Kyle Valenti.</p><p>“Do you think he’ll forgive me?” Kyle ask and Michael just blinks at him, he blames it on the tiredness, lingering soreness and worry over Alex that it takes him a minute to figure out what the hell Kyle is talking about.</p><p>“I think the minute you asked for forgiveness he gave it,” he says, if he’d had any say in the situation, he would have wanted a <i>lot</i> more groveling on Kyle’s part.</p><p>Maybe some begging.</p><p>But that’s one of the best things about Alex, his giant squishy heart.</p><p>His ability to forgive, though Michael is hoping that forgiveness will never extend to his dad. He’s fairly sure it never will.</p><p>He’s also completely confident that in the fact that Alex’s <i>mom</i> is going to make sure that it never does.</p><p>“You think?” Kyle asks, the expression on his face when he looks over at Michael is so hopeful that its actually kind of painful to look at.</p><p>“Oh my god,” Michael mutters, he drags the non-casted hand over his face and considers hitting himself upside the head with the casted one just so this conversation will be over sooner rather than later.</p><p>He’s saved by Kyle’s mom coming through the door. She looks pleased at the sight of the two of them not fighting with each other.</p><p>“Hey mom,” Kyle says, grinning at her and she rolls her eyes at him but brushes her hand over his head and presses a kiss to his forehead.</p><p>“How are you feeling?” she asks and Michael thinks for a moment that she’s talking to Kyle but when he looks over she’s staring at him, an expectant look on her face.</p><p>“Um, okay,” he says dumbly. “Hand still kind of hurts a bit.”</p><p>“I’m sure it will for a while,” she says. “I’m sure you’ve already been told…”</p><p>“My caseworker said something,” Michael says, “and Kyle mentioned it.”</p><p>“I know it’s not ideal, and you’ll be eighteen by the time they probably think about discharging you so you’re probably thinking it’s kind of pointless… but Jim said they think they <i>might</i> have found some of your family after all this time so I think a controlled, secure environment for you to meet them in while you continue to heal is probably not going to be amiss.”</p><p>“They found your family?” Kyle asks, and there’s a note to his voice that sounds a lot like Kyle is happy for him. “Why didn’t you say something man? Do Max and Isobel know? Neither one of them said anything, though they were kind of distracted so maybe…”</p><p>“I don’t,” Michael shrugs, pulls his casted hand tight to his body, drags the fingers of his other through his hair. “I haven’t met them yet,” he says weakly.</p><p>“Still, that’s awesome,” and there’s a smile of genuine happiness <i>for</i> him on Kyle’s face that Michael doesn’t even know what to do with. He looks at Kyle’s mom with an expression that he’s hoping doesn’t convey his absolute desperation for this conversation to be over with.</p><p>“We’ll let you get some rest,” she says, hand wrapping around Kyle’s arm and tugging him to his feet.</p><p>It’s quiet in the room after they leave, with the door shut he can barely hear anything happening in the hallway or the rest of the hospital.</p><p>He wonders how badly he’d get yelled at if he tried to sneak back into Alex’s room and sleep with his head resting on Alex’s mattress, hands folded together.</p><p>The nurses and doctors would probably complain it wasn’t good sleep, but Michael thinks it might be the best sleep he would have had since this whole thing started.</p><p> </p>
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</div><p> </p><p>Alex is already awake and sort of listlessly poking at what looks like really watered-down oatmeal when Michael rolls into his room.</p><p>He’s walking under his own power and trying his best to ignore the nurse following behind him with a wheelchair and frowning in disapproval.</p><p>Alex’s face brightens when he sees him which makes Michael stand just that little bit straighter and grin back at him in return. The chair pulled up close to the bed probably had Alex’s mom in it at some point, but she’s not here now so he settles himself in it. Taking the hand that Alex offers him and linking their fingers together, pressing the back of his hand against his cheek.</p><p>“So apparently I’m going to live with the Valenti’s once they finally kick me out of the hospital,” Michael says, because he’s almost positive he mentioned this, but Alex has been asleep and awake and asleep and awake so he might not even remember the conversation.</p><p>“That’s…” Alex looks bewildered, “aren’t you going to be eighteen in like days?”</p><p>Michael doesn’t think his grin could get any bigger but he thinks he could eclipse the sun at the thought that Alex knows when his birthday is. Chances are he knows it because it’s the same day as Max and Isobel’s and Isobel definitely believes in celebrating her birthday.</p><p>Sometimes with multiple parties with vastly different friend groups. Though there’d always been just a little one with just the three of them.</p><p>But Michael is choosing to believe that it’s because of him.</p><p>“Just what I got told, Kyle seemed okay with it,” he shrugs finally, Alex rubs his thumb against the side of his hand where they’re still linked.</p><p>“He hated being an only child, always wanted a sibling,” Alex says, “I don’t think you’re really the little sister that he was always asking for though.”</p><p>Michael huffs a laugh, because that was almost exactly what Kyle had said which is just more evidence to layer on that Alex and Kyle were closer friends then Michael ever remembers them being.</p><p>“Eat your breakfast,” Michael says, he presses his lips against the back of Alex’s hand then lets it go and leans back in the chair. Watches as Alex’s nose wrinkles in disgust.</p><p>“I really want a breakfast burrito,” Alex mutters, “or even just hashbrowns, it doesn’t taste like anything.”</p><p>Michael wisely doesn’t mention the runny eggs and toast he’d had for his own breakfast, even if that’s not what Alex wants he thinks he’d still be upset by the comparison.</p><p> </p>
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</div><p> </p><p>The breakfast tray is long gone, only half the oatmeal eaten which had resulted in a temperature check and a vial of blood for tests. Alex’s comments on the boring bland food are completely ignored in favor of there apparently being a medical reason for his lack of appetite.</p><p>Michael has his head resting against Alex’s mattress, Alex’s fingers running through his hair. The TV is on low but he’s almost sure it’s on strictly for background noise and neither one of them are watching it.</p><p>It’s quiet and calm, peaceful. It can’t go on long enough in Michael’s opinion and he’s not a fan of having the quiet disturbed when Kyle comes slamming into the room.</p><p>He’s already got his glare firmly in place when he looks up, though any words he was going to speak die when he actually gets a good <i>look</i> at Kyle.</p><p>He looks distressed, face pale and if he concentrates he’s fairly sure he can see that Kyle is actually <i>shaking</i>.</p><p>“What’s going on?” Alex asks with no small measure of alarm. He shifts on the bed and Michael lays his hand Alex’s, squeezing lightly to keep him stationary in the bed.</p><p>“I…” Kyle stutters and stops, hands waving and then covering his face.</p><p>Max slips past him into the room, tugging on Kyle’s arm to move him away from the door so it can close with a quiet click behind him.</p><p>“Rosa’s apparently his sister,” Max says when Kyle doesn’t say anything, and Michael raises an eyebrow at him.</p><p>“Half-sister,” Kyle mumbles into his hands, “she’s my half-sister.”</p><p>“The Sheriff and Kyle’s mom and Liz’s dad were arguing and it kind of came out,” Max frowns, “It sounded like Liz’s dad already knew, but his mom <i>definitely</i> didn’t and she is <i>not</i> happy about it, not at all.”</p><p>“I wanted a baby sister,” Kyle says faintly, with just the tiniest bit of disbelief that Michael can hear tinging it, “not a…”</p><p>“Older sister who questioned your masculinity and threatened to cut off your dick if you touched Liz in a way that she wasn’t completely on board with,” Alex says, he’s folded Michael’s hand into his again, playing with his fingers idly and looking so much like Alex from a week ago minus the nose ring and plus a bunch of bruises that Michael wants to sob with relief that they’re still here.</p><p>Kyle’s hands drop from his face and there’s a look passing between them that Michael can’t decipher.</p><p>“I told you, you have to be more specific when you’re asking for things, you ask for a sister the universe is going to be like how badly can we screw them all over and still give him what he wants…”</p><p>“I would have thought it was implied, that since I was already born that I wanted a <i>baby</i> sister, not an older sister,” Kyle says.</p><p>Alex rolls his eyes.</p><p>“So why are they even arguing about something like that?” Alex blinks, “is Rosa okay, did she…” he cuts himself off, bites his lip and the fingers around Michael’s tighten imperceptibly.</p><p>“Rosa’s okay,” Kyle says, then amends, “well she’s alive anyway…” he looks over at Max.</p><p>“Jasmine is dead,” Max says, “Kate, you know Wyatt’s sister? She’s in a medically induced coma supposedly and Rosa…”</p><p>“Rosa?” Alex prompts, face still pale, fingers still tight around Michael’s.</p><p>“She’s alive, not woken up yet and they’re waiting for tests and stuff,” Max drags a hand over his face. “They’re talking like maybe there were drugs involved.”</p><p> </p>
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<a name="section0015"><h2>15. Book 2: Chapter 15</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <b>Legacies 15/?</b><br/>
</p><p> </p><p>Alex falls asleep about thirty minutes after they finish dinner, some oatmeal looking thing for Alex again and the questionable meatloaf that Max and Kyle had been arguing about the day prior.</p><p>Michael hangs out in his room, TV volume down low and holding Alex’s lax fingers in his own.</p><p>“Go on back to your room now,” Alex’s mom comes in, she’d come in around lunch time and then was gone again after she talked quietly with Alex for about half an hour.</p><p>“Are you okay?” Michael asks, she looks pale but there’s also a steely resolve in her eyes.</p><p>“Just adult stuff, nothing you need to worry about,” she shakes her head as she glances at the watch on her wrist. “They're going to making you go back shortly anyway,” her mouth quirks a bit into something that reminds him of Alex and he squeezes Alex’s fingers to prove that he’s right there. Sleeping through Michael talking to his mom.</p><p>Michael uses the bed to push himself to his feet, he kind of figured a nurse would have shown up with a wheelchair if they <i>really</i> wanted him back in his room, but maybe they figured that if he made it down the hallway under his own power that he can make his way back as well.</p><p>“One of his brothers is coming in tomorrow at some point,” she says as Michael makes his way slowly to the door.</p><p>“Should I make myself scarce, I can….” he has a bit of schoolwork left to do from what Isobel brought him, not enough to keep himself busy the entire day even if he triple-checks his work.</p><p>“No, I just wanted to warn you so if you came in after breakfast you weren’t startled by an overprotective older brother looming over Alex’s bed,” she says with a grin and Michael probably doesn’t manage to hide the relief at not being kept away from Alex off his face from the way her expression softens.</p><p>“Go get some sleep,” she says, “It does Alex no good if he’s well rested and you collapse from exhaustion.”</p><p>“You’ll tell him I said goodnight?”</p><p>“Of course,” she says as she rounds the bound and sits in the chair that he’d just vacated, she shifts it back a bit and pulls her phone out of her bag and Michael takes one last look at Alex looking peaceful in sleep and starts his short trek down the hall.</p><p>He’s really only four rooms away, they’re even in the same hallway, that morning it had seemed like the shortest trip ever.</p><p>It’s only a bunch of hours later; but spending those hours in that uncomfortable chair pulled up close to Alex’s bed his body is now angrily reminding him that he’s gone through a trauma and there’s no way for Max to heal him even just the tiniest bit until after Michael is released from the hospital and away from questioning eyes.</p><p>He pushes his door open and is surprised by Maria’s mom standing just inside.</p><p>“I was just coming to see if you were still in Alex’s room,” she says warmly as she reaches around him and holds the door open while he enters.</p><p>David is standing there, an older woman with a closely shaved head standing near him.</p><p>He stops and stares at her, blinks slowly as her eyes well up with tears, hands folded together in front of her face.</p><p>Those eyes are <i>so</i> familiar and he clenches his hands in fist at the quick flashes of memory, of long wavy blond hair leaning over him and brushing his face as she kissed his forehead. Of warm arms wrapped around him rocking back and forth, of a quiet voice singing softly in a language that he <i>knows</i> but doesn’t understand any longer.</p><p>“Mom,” he says in a faint soft voice and Mimi’s hands wrap around his arms and guide him to the bed, David pressing a faintly glowing hand against his arm.</p><p>He goes to pull away, they’ll be found <i>out</i>, they’ll take them away, all of them this time and he has Alex now. He has Max and Isobel and Alex and he supposes he’s probably got to add Liz and Maria and Kyle to that list now as well.</p><p>“Just enough,” David soothes, “we won’t put anyone at risk.”</p><p>The last thing he remembers is his mom’s hand cool against the skin of his face, smoothing his hair back. He blinks slowly and looks to David then back at her, her face is damp, and her lips are curved in an <i>utterly</i> familiar smile.</p><p>“Mom.”</p><p> </p>
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</div><p> </p><p>He’s alone in the room when he wakes, the curtains are drawn and the lights are dimmed down to their lowest setting. He lays there and he doesn’t think he imagined it, he was tired yes, but not tired enough that he thinks he would hallucinate David and Maria’s mom and <i>his mom</i>.</p><p>“I had Mimi take them back, no sense in drawing too much unneeded attention right away,” comes from the doorway and when Michael squints in that direction he can see the Sheriff standing there. When he walks in, allowing the door to drift closed behind him Michael can see the lines of exhaustion on his face. Dark circles under his eyes screaming that he’s not sleeping.</p><p>“She’s my mom,” Michael says softly. Even he can hear the faint note of wonder and disbelief in his voice.</p><p>He’d always thought, <i>they’d</i> always thought they were alone. That it was just the three of them alone and abandoned on this world.</p><p>To know they weren’t… he’s not sure how he feels about that.  But it also adds more questions, like if his mom and David were the only ones being held wherever they were locked up, or if…</p><p>“Does this mean that…” he doesn’t finish the thought, he doesn’t want to out Max and Isobel if the Sheriff doesn’t know about them yet.</p><p>And this could all be some elaborate trap to put them all in captivity somewhere. Though it kind of seems like maybe that would be counterproductive since the Sheriff and Maria’s mom had been the ones to get them out of wherever they were being held in the first place.</p><p>“I don’t know,” the Sheriff says, he sits down with a sigh in the chair that he thinks Kyle was the last one sitting in. “Haven’t really had a chance to debrief with anyone, though I think Mimi would have mentioned if Max and Isobel had surviving parents.”</p><p>Michael tries to swallow past the fear looming, he <i>knows</i>, he knows about Max and Isobel and…</p><p>“None of that now son,” the Sheriff says softly, he doesn’t touch him doesn’t really make any movement other then sitting there in the chair trying his best to look unintimidating and not at all like every boogeyman that Michael had ever had probably mostly irrational fears of.</p><p>“You know,” Michael breathes, he’s lucky he’s not hooked up to all the machines that Alex is anymore, he’d have a whole cadre of nurses and doctors in the room with them.</p><p>“I didn’t, not until we approached them about maybe helping Alex and their favor for lending assistance was only to help them locate some missing children,” the Sheriff says.</p><p>“What’s going to happen now?” he asks and the Sheriff just grins at him softly. Like he can tell that Michael is panicking about being taken away from Alex, about them all being locked up in cells and keys subsequently thrown away.</p><p>“Still got some cards to play, Jesse Manes isn’t the only one with some contacts, it’ll take some time to get stuff lined up so until then we’re going to keep things on the downlow,” the Sheriff says with a  wry grin, “David wanted to prove to Nora that we’d upheld our end of the bargain so we agreed to let her come and see you.”</p><p>“This would be a lot easier if you’d just read Michelle in on the situation at the very beginning,” Maria’s mom says from the doorway, Michael looks over at it in surprise, he hadn’t even heard her push it open.</p><p>“She didn’t need to know, and honestly she would have probably thought we were all nuts,” the Sheriff sighs. “But Mindy and I are going to talk to her, so at the very least she’s not shocked by Nora being in our house on a frequent basis or by the fact that Michael’s injuries are going to spontaneously heal after we can stop worrying about a doctor asking the wrong questions at the wrong times.”</p><p>The Sheriff gets to his feet with a sigh, “she’s probably going to still think we’re nuts.”</p><p>“Well maybe you’ll get lucky and it’ll distract her from Rosa’s existence long enough for the poor girl to at least regain consciousness.”</p><p> </p>
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</div><p> </p><p>Max is already in his room when he wakes up in the morning, slouched in a chair quietly reading some worn paperback in the corner of the room. At least he’s not attached at the hip with Kyle at the moment so Michael is spared the frankly bizarre sight of the two of them now buddying it up.</p><p>“I can literally hear you thinking,” Max mutters, he folds the book closed, running his hand over the cover like it’s a baby that he’s soothing to sleep.</p><p>“Valenti, seriously?” Michael says grumpily, the sun isn’t even up yet, the morning nurse hasn’t appeared and neither has his breakfast.</p><p>“He’s really not that bad once you get to know him a little better,” Max says, “did you know he wants to go to medical school? I honestly would never have pegged him for the type.”</p><p>“Well he was dating Liz, she’s not exactly stupid you know,” Michael says, him and Liz have been battling for the top grades for four years. He never really paid any attention to where any of their other classmates fell as none of them were really any sort of competition to him. He can’t imagine Kyle is up in their league though, he fell in with the jocks easily enough which doesn’t scream intelligence to Michael at all.</p><p>“You and Is are really pushing this whole joining up of our friend group, you know you don’t need to do that, right?”</p><p>“It was Is’ idea,” Max shrugs, most of the decisions they’ve ever made have been based on Isobel’s idea so Michael can believe it. It’s not like Michael or Max have <i>actually</i> gone out of their way to date anyone seriously, but he wouldn’t put it past her to have had some sort of game plan in the works for the day that happened.</p><p>The chances of them staying single forever was unlikely.</p><p>“Where is Is anyway?” Michael asks, he doesn’t ask about Kyle’s whereabouts because hopefully the previous days are an anomaly and maybe they’ll get back to the status quo.</p><p>“She’s with Liz and Maria visiting Rosa who still isn’t awake so I’m not sure of the point but…” Max shrugs, “Kyle ran into Alex’s brother Greg? So he stopped to talk to him.”</p><p>Michael sighs and Max grins at him.</p><p>“He’s really not that bad, and you know if Alex forgives him that you’re going to have to try and be nice to him.”</p><p>Michael huffs, but doesn’t disagree with him.</p><p>Because as much as he hates it, Max is right, though there’s no ‘if’ there. The moment Kyle asked for forgiveness Alex gave it, which means Michael could continue picking at Kyle for past bad behaviors or he could try and see who this guy is that Alex was friends with and Liz dated, that Maria tolerated and Max is becoming best buds with.</p><p>He’s probably going to be somebody that Michael is going to end up liking it, he doesn’t think he can fully articulate how much he hates that idea.</p><p> </p>
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<a name="section0016"><h2>16. Book 2: Chapter 16</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <b>Legacies 16/?</b><br/>
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<p>Breakfast finally shows up with his morning nurse, runny scrambled eggs again, wheat toast with no butter (but a little cup of jam on the side) and some sort of yogurt parfait thing that if Isobel was in the room she would likely have already called dibs on <i>and</i> already snatched off his tray.</p>
<p>The nurse writes her name on his white board asks him a couple of distracted questions, barely waits for any of his answers and is gone just as quickly as she arrived.</p>
<p>It’s weird but Michael is hoping that her lack of interest means discharge in the next couple of days, though that also means becoming roomies with Kyle so maybe he’s okay with staying in the hospital until it’s time for college.</p>
<p>When he’s done eating he pushes the tray to the side and goes to get out of the bed, Max watches him with careful eyes as he does so. But whatever David did the night before has left him feeling closer to normal then he has for days.</p>
<p>“Should I get a wheelchair?” Max asks, though he doesn’t make any move to go get one.</p>
<p>“I’ve got two working legs,” Michael says and Max raises an eyebrow but doesn’t disagree with him, and at least he doesn’t snag the wheelchair on their way out the door to follow him down the hallway grumbling like the nurse had the previous day.</p>
<p>Kyle and a guy that looks vaguely familiar are standing right outside Alex’s room. He’s in civilian clothes but Michael hasn’t seen any guy with a haircut <i>that</i> short unless they were military or a questionable <i>other</i> type of organization.</p>
<p>“I was going to come and get you, did you hear?” Kyle asks and there’s a brightness in his eyes that Michael is sure he’s never seen before and probably doesn’t want to be seeing right now.</p>
<p>“Hear what?” Max asks, stepping right up next to Michael so they’re shoulder to shoulder. “Hi, I’m Max, this is Michael,” he says to the guy that Michael is fairly confident is Alex’s older brother Greg.</p>
<p>“Greg,” is confirmed and Michael has to force himself to not shrink back and hide behind Max at the way that Greg’s eyes focus on him.</p>
<p>Searching for all his faults and probably finding him <i>extremely</i> lacking as a prospective partner for Alex. “I’d give you the trite big brother speech but it kind of feels like it would be in bad taste considering the circumstances.”</p>
<p>“Kate Long woke up this morning,” Kyle interrupts.</p>
<p>“What about Rosa?” Max asks and Kyle shakes his head, the brightness dimming just a bit.</p>
<p>“Not yet, they’re doing a bunch of tests and stuff, but get this, Kate said they were attacked by some homeless looking guy in the desert and…” Kyle’s hands are waving around.</p>
<p>“It’s all hearsay from the nurses, so absolutely <i>none</i> of that has been confirmed,” Greg says shaking his head. “Though I guess I should be glad Alex is confined to the hospital or you two would be out there trying to impersonate the Hardy Boys.”</p>
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<p>Alex is glaring at his oatmeal when they file in, though at least it looks like he ate some of it. Probably trying to stave off nurses or doctors with needles in tow if he tried to send back another breakfast tray with barely anything eaten.</p>
<p>His expression cheers immeasurably when he sees Michael, then his brother right behind him. Greg stops on the other side of the bed while Michael goes around and pulls what he’s actually considering <i>his</i> chair close to the bed and making himself comfortable.</p>
<p>“Mom said you were coming but…” Alex is saying and he looks like he wants to be smiling but Michael knows he’s afraid of being too happy to see one of his brothers and then having them spout off their dads viewpoints at him while Alex isn’t really mentally able to defend himself.</p>
<p>“You’d rather I be here anyway, Flint is being an absolute dick and Clay is well,” Greg shrugs, “Clay is Clay. He’ll figure it out at some point I’m sure, hopefully we’re not all dead of old age by that point but….”</p>
<p>Alex just looks at him and Greg looks steadily back eyebrow arched just the tiniest bit; Alex’s mouth twitches and Greg grins at him.</p>
<p>“I’m going to go see if I can find mom,” Greg says, reaching out to tap Alex’s arm with two fingers, something in his expression darkens at the sight of the bruises lining Alex’s arms.</p>
<p>“See if she’ll tell you how Rosa is doing?” Alex asks, “I asked this morning and got the standard she’s still unconscious, then a long speech about worrying about my own health and to let the grownups worry about Rosa’s.”</p>
<p>Greg rolls his eyes but doesn’t say anything just spins out on his heel and heads out the door.</p>
<p>Alex sighs and reaches out a hand toward Michael, a soft smile curving his lips as Michael laces their fingers together and grins at him.</p>
<p>“Kate Long is awake,” Kyle finally says and Michael is proud of himself for not grumbling under his breath, especially since Kyle speaking has Alex focusing all his attention on him instead of Michael.</p>
<p>“Did she…” Alex starts then shakes his head, “your dad wouldn’t have been the one to question her.”</p>
<p>“No, he was in the room because they’re not sending anyone down from Albuquerque until the end of the week, so he had one of the deputies asking the question…”</p>
<p>“Lancer?” Alex asks and Michael exchanges looks with Max because he’d thought Greg had been <i>kidding</i> with the Hardy Boy’s comment.</p>
<p>“Can’t keep his mouth shut around a pretty girl at all,” Kyle nods and grins, “he was talking to one of the nurses after and he told her that Kate said Rosa <i>saved</i> her, that there was some creepy looking homeless man and he came after them, killed Jasmine and went after Kate and Rosa dragged him off her. She doesn’t know what happened after that but she said Rosa got her to one of the cars and he like ran them off the road or something.”</p>
<p>“Jesus,” Alex breathes and Michael doesn’t like the look on his face. It’s like he can see the ideas swirling around.</p>
<p>“You are confined to a hospital bed,” Michael says, because he feels like someone has to point it out or there’s a better then likely chance he’s going to come back one morning and Alex is going to be off haring about trying to solve a mystery or something.</p>
<p>“Kyle still has all four workable limbs,” Alex says waving a hand at where Kyle is nodding along. “And they’re probably going to make me start moving around soon…”</p>
<p>“I kind of think maybe that’s what they pay your dad and mom to do?” Max says pointedly, both Kyle and Alex both look at him with identical expressions of disbelief on their faces.</p>
<p>“Where’s your sense of adventure, man?” Kyle asks and Max just looks at him then looks over at Michael, eyes practically begging him for backup.</p>
<p>“I think our sense of adventure kind of took a nosedive out the window when, I don’t know, this crazy homeless guy killed Jasmine, almost killed Kate and Rosa and we don’t actually know what’s going on?” Michael drawls.</p>
<p>“Don’t you want to know what happened?” Alex asks softly.</p>
<p>“Yeah,” Michael says, squeezing his fingers, making sure Alex’s attention stays on him instead of flickering over to Kyle, “but I think I’m also okay reading about it in the newspaper or hearing about it on the news after they catch this guy.”</p>
<p>Alex blinks at him then smiles at him, beautifully wide and happiness sparking a light in his eyes.</p>
<p>“You’re worried about me,” he breathes, Michael wants to press his lips against the back of his hand, wants to lay his head on the bed and let Alex comb long fingers through his hair and stare at the smile until it’s time to sleep.</p>
<p>But he’s ever mindful of the way that Max and Kyle are watching them, he’s sure neither one of them would care, not anymore.</p>
<p>But it’s been literal days since Kyle has stopped being the homophobic douchey jock asshole that Michal has spent years going to school with, if it was just Max he wouldn’t care. But he’s not giving Kyle any ammunition that can be wielded in cruel ways after Kyle goes <i>back</i> to being the guy that Michael has gone through high school with.</p>
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Liz ducks her head in and grins when she sees Alex awake, their fingers are just barely intertwined but he can see the way she wants to coo at them and manages to just bite it back.</p>
<p>“I wonder how long it’ll take for the nurses to decide there’s too many people in this room,” Maria says as she comes in, Isobel looks pale but put together and annoyed as she follows behind them.</p>
<p>“They wouldn’t let us see her,” she says, she leans into Max’s side. Michael realizes that he didn’t tell Max about David and his <i>mom</i> being in his room the previous night and has a brief fear that they mind whammied him into not saying anything.</p>
<p>He doesn’t think they’d do that, but they’re adults and most of the adults that he’s ever come into contact with like to make decisions for the kids under their control and spout off the ‘for your own good’ rhetoric to uphold their points.</p>
<p>Liz is perched on the other side of Alex’s bed, not touching him when Michael looks back.</p>
<p>“Kyle said Kate Long was talking though?” Alex is asking quietly and Michael squeezes the tips of his fingers. “I didn’t say anything about…”</p>
<p>“Yeah, she said Rosa saved her, that she would have been dead,” Liz lets out a loud breath through pursed lips. “Probably should be glad she didn’t throw Rosa under the bus and blame the whole thing on her regardless,” she says bitterly.</p>
<p>“Gossip <i>not</i> heard from Kate is that her and Jasmine were trying to get Rosa to buy them drugs and she told them to fuck off, that she didn’t do that anymore,” Maria says. She’s leaning against the wall, arms crossed over her chest and Michael is kind of surprised to see Kyle push himself to his feet, shifting away from the chair.</p>
<p>Maria huffs but slides into it without saying anything, a glance at Alex shows him looking at Kyle with approval.</p>
<p>“We should…” Alex starts and Maria laughs suddenly, all eyes focusing on her.</p>
<p>“I’m suddenly having flashbacks to 2nd grade, if Alex pulls out the steno notebook and Kyle pulls out the walkie talkies I just want everyone to know that I love and adore most of you but I’m out,” she mutters with a shrug.</p>
<p>“I’d forgotten all about that,” Liz laughs and Michael glances at Alex to see his cheeks flushed, “didn’t you guys make up business cards and everything?”</p>
<p>“I’m going to need to see these,” Michael says, he can’t picture the Alex he’s known these last couple of months being into that type of thing..</p>
<p>“I’m sure my dad junked that all that type of stuff, anything my mom was a fan of my dad made sure disappeared after she left,” he says quietly, shaking his head. Michael squeezes his fingers again both force Alex to look at him but also as a sign of support he hopes.</p>
<p>“I think I still have some,” Kyle says sheepishly, “I… you know it was <i>our</i> thing and…” he waves a hand but Michael doesn’t have the first clue what he could mean by it.</p>
<p>He’s not sure he wants to.</p>
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<a name="section0017"><h2>17. Book 2: Chapter 17</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <b>Legacies 17/?</b><br/>
</p><p>The nurses finally figure out that there is <i>way</i> too many people lounging about in Alex’s room when the lunch tray shows up. She sends them all on their way which Michael thinks is patently unfair since she includes him within her directive.</p><p>He does wait until everyone else has left, the nurse standing by the door hands on her hips but pointedly not looking at them.</p><p>Michael brushes his lips against the back of Alex’s hand that he’s been holding and is momentarily mollified by the disgruntled expression on Alex’s face. Which he’s sure is actually mirrored on his.</p><p>“You both should be resting,” the nurse says, she’s still not looking at them, “I’m sure you can make your way back in a few hours,” she glances over at them and sighs, “but there should really no more than three people in here at a time.”</p><p>Her voice sounds so stern and unapologetic, but there’s a smile gracing in her face and her eyes are warm.</p><p>“We were just talking,” Alex says, his fingers are clinging to Michael’s like he doesn’t want him to go, Michael doesn’t want to let go either but he doesn’t put it past her to call an orderly and have him dragged from the room, warm eyes and smile notwithstanding.</p><p>“You can talk some more later, eat lunch, rest,” she says as she pulls the door open, “Come along now Mr. Guerin.”</p><p>“I’ll be back later,” Michael promises, another kiss to the back of Alex’s hand and a quick glance shows the nurse with her back to them so he presses his luck just the tiniest bit and presses a quick kiss to Alex’s lips.</p><p>Nothing like the kisses they’d shared in the shed before everything went to hell and dragged them along for the ride, just a reminder that he’s there.</p><p>That Alex is still there, and they may not have defeated the monster themselves; but the monster had been defeated, nonetheless.</p><p>Alex’s fingertips drag against his skin and when Michael stands he can see that bright light that he adores shining in Alex’s eyes.</p><p>He can also see the exhaustion and while he still doesn’t want to leave, he’d be okay laying his head beside Alex’s hand and napping while Alex did, he doesn’t think the nurse in the doorway would think that suitable rest.</p><p>“Come along Romeo,” she murmurs as he takes the couple of steps to the door, she doesn’t even give him a moment to look back before she’s letting the door close between them.</p><p>Maria and Max are standing in the hallway waiting, no Liz, Kyle or Isobel in sight.</p><p>“They’re going to see if they can get in to see Rosa yet,” Maria says by way of explanation.</p><p>“Can I trust the two of you to make sure he goes back to his own room for a few hours?” the nurse asks, like she doesn’t trust him to not just sneak right back into Alex’s room while her back is turned.</p><p>“His lunch tray is probably there waiting,” Max says, “if nothing else he’ll at least have to eat something.”</p><p>“Yesterday they brought my lunch tray to Alex’s room,” Michael grumbles. He’s not sure what’s different about yesterday and today, but he’d really like it to be yesterday still.</p><p>The nurse just raises her eyebrow and turns on her heel. Her shoes don’t make any sound at all as she walks way, they don’t even squeak on the shiny floor.</p><p>“I kind of figured it’d be you and Kyle again,” Michael says to Max as they shepherd him down the hallway and into his room. His lunch tray is covered in plastic wrap and sitting on the table by his bed just as Max predicted.</p><p>“I don’t think Kyle wants to answer whatever inevitable questions you have about his and Alex’s foray into being child detectives,” Maria says, she digs through her purse and pulls out two granola bars, offering the second one to Max.</p><p>“I can run to the cafeteria and grab us something,” Max offers even as he tears the wrapper open and eats half the granola bar in one bite.</p><p>“They’re probably not going to make it into Rosa’s room, so I figured we just wait until they get back and either see if the cafeteria food has gotten any better in the past twelve hours or we could run over to the Crashdown and get something,” Maria shrugs.</p><p>“I thought Alex’s brother was kidding with the Hardy boys stuff,” Michael says peeling the plastic wrapping off his lunch tray, “and I think I can safely say that the food hasn’t gotten much better… can you bring me back a burger or fries or something that doesn’t smell like whatever this is supposed to be.”</p><p>“I think it’s supposed to be good for you,” Max says even as his nose wrinkles.</p><p>“A burger would be good for me too,” Michael says.</p><p>“Totally not kidding, Alex wanted to be like his mom when he was a kid…” Maria says.</p><p>“His mom is some sort of detective?” Michael tries to envision the woman standing at Alex’s bedside and there’s nothing about her that would scream hardened private detective or detective of any sort. He’s not sure what he thinks she would be doing, but certainly not that.</p><p>Which he doesn’t say out loud, because it’ll make him sound like the sort of asshole that stereotypes women based on the appearance and Maria <i>will</i> punch him not to mention what Isobel would do if she realized he was thinking like that.</p><p>“I’m not actually sure what she does,” Maria rolls her shoulders, “but Alex said once that she finds people so probably close enough.”</p><p>The room goes silent save for the sound of Michael eating and Max folding the empty granola bar wrapper into a tiny square.</p><p>“So what’s the deal with you and Kyle?” Maria finally asks, when Michael looks up she’s staring directly at Max and Max is hunched over in his seat and <i>not</i> looking at her.</p><p>“What do you mean?” Max asks, and Maria makes a scoffing noise that screams disbelief, Michael totally gets it.</p><p>“Two weeks ago you probably wouldn’t have even called 911 if he was passed out in a hallway and now…”</p><p>“He’s not that bad,” Max says and there’s a tone to his voice that Michael has learned over the years means Max is <i>done</i> with the conversation and will likely completely ignore any attempts to continue it.</p><p>He shakes his head when Maria goes to press on. It’s completely not worth the silent treatment if Max gets <i>too</i> annoyed.</p><p>“I’m going to go see if they’re ready to get lunch,” Maria says finally, the heels of boots click on the floor as she stalks to the door.</p><p>“Just one thing,” Michael says, as he pokes at the food left on his tray. He <i>really</i> wants a burger, or even just a milkshake or something that at least resembles food that he wants to eat.</p><p>“What?” Max asks, voice still annoyed though he does look over at him.</p><p>“A warning or heads up or something if you decide that you’re going to try and date Valenti.”</p><p>“I’m not…” Max stutters though he flushes a bit and is no longer looking at him.</p><p>“Please, Maria may be new and all but I’m not and I know that look on your face,” Michael says, Max doesn’t say anything to dispute it just glares at him. Which is answer enough really.</p><p> </p>
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Michael doesn’t say anything when it’s Kyle that pokes his head into the room to tell Max they’re going for lunch.</p><p>“Burger, fries,” Michael says and smiles his brightest smile at Max, Max doesn’t even look at him just waves a hand in his direction as he brushes past Kyle to leave the room. Isobel slips in as he does, the door closing behind her.</p><p>“You’re not going with them?” he asks.</p><p>“You really think I want to spend an hour in a booth watching Max try to figure out which of them to pathetically moon over?” Isobel rolls her eyes and paces the room for a moment before sitting in the chair that Max had vacated.</p><p>“What is he even doing?” Michael asks, Isobel has a direct link to Max’s brain, she should know what the hell is going through his brain.</p><p>“I’ve not got a clue,” she sounds bewildered, “And he’s in for a disappointment because I’m almost entirely sure that Liz and Kyle are maybe dating again, maybe,” she shrugs, tapping her fingernails against the arms of the chair.</p><p>“Max has never even looked at a guy twice unless he was holding a book in his hands,” Michael says, he lays his fork down on his tray and pushes the table away. He’s ate almost all his food so he <i>probably</i> won’t get yelled at.</p><p>He’s also really holding out hope that someone will bring him back <i>real</i> food.</p><p>“To be fair, you didn’t either,” Isobel says with a perfectly arched eyebrow and a smirk, “and you seem to have swept Alex Manes off his feet in a pretty quick fashion.”</p><p>“Alex is different,” Michael says, it sounds weak even to his own ears. “Why didn’t you ever tell us about Rosa?” he asks in a desperate bid to change the subject.</p><p>Isobel’s mouth twists, the expression on her face is… weird, Michael doesn’t have any other word for it. He’s known Isobel for as long as he can remember, she’s one of two absolute constants in his life that he knows he can depend on, he’s <i>never</i> seen her look lost or confused like she does right now.</p><p>“Is…” he starts softly.</p><p>She twists her hands together, doesn’t meet his eyes.</p><p>“I don’t remember,” she barely whispers, he can hardly hear her and he stares at her feeling just about as hopeless as he did when Alex’s dad had walked into the shed and picked up that hammer.</p><p>“Maria says she’s talked about me, never by name but with just enough detail that she can apparently piece together the pieces,” Isobel’s head is bowed, her voice is quiet. “But I don’t…”</p><p>“Is…”</p><p>“I don’t remember her, Michael,” Isobel says, “I don’t… I mean I know her, I know I’ve talked to her but I’ve… there’s just nothing there, not like there should be if Maria is right…”</p><p>“Maybe she’s wrong,” Michael says and Isobel shakes her head in denial before Michael even has the words out of her mouth.</p><p>“She’s not wrong, she’s… I didn’t tell you, not either of you so don’t go thinking Max and I are keeping secrets, because we’re not, but…”</p><p>There’s a horrible pit opening in Michael’s stomach and he wants to be back in Alex’s room, curled up in an uncomfortable chair, resting his head on Alex’s bed while Alex played with his hair. He wants Max back with all his Kyle and Liz related drama following behind him.</p><p>He wants his <i>mom</i> and David to show up and help him help Isobel so he doesn’t feel completely helpless anymore.</p><p>“Maybe I’m going crazy,” Isobel says, voice cracking on a sob, she’s still not looking at him. “Isn’t that what missing time and blackouts and… I’m going crazy… or I’m developing a split personality or…”</p><p>“You didn’t suddenly turn into some crazy homeless guy and kill Jasmine, try to kill Rosa and Kate,” Michael says firmly.</p><p>“Michael…” Isobel starts.</p><p>“We’re going to figure this out, we’ll get the Sheriff to bring mom back and her or David will be able to figure out what’s happening to you and Rosa will wake and she’ll either say yes you’re dating and we’ll figure out what the hell is happening after that or she’ll be like ew Maria, really and we’ll know that her taste sucks but that you’ve also not been secretly dating someone you don’t remember secretly dating.”</p><p>“You were secretly dating Alex Manes,” Isobel says and Michael huffs, because yes, but only like for six hours, it wasn’t like he was going to say ‘hold that thought Alex while I text my siblings an update on my love life before we have sex’.</p><p>“We’ll figure it out Isobel,” Michael promises, and Isobel smiles weakly at him but doesn’t argue so he takes it as the win it is.</p><p> </p>
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<a name="section0018"><h2>18. Book 2: Chapter 18</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <b>Legacies 18/?</b><br/>
</p><p>They walk through what Isobel knows in painstakingly slow detail. Not that Isobel knows much, just waking up places she doesn’t remember going in the first place, people being mad at her for random arguments that she doesn’t remember having.</p><p>The blackouts are the most concerning and Michael wishes Max were there, the brain twins could do their thing and Max would maybe see something that Michael can’t see.</p><p>Though Isobel doesn’t seem to think that will be the case.</p><p>“I may have asked him once if he was noticing anything different about me,” Isobel mutters, “he thought I was talking about my hair or my nails or something.”</p><p>“We need to talk to my mom,” Michael says, the immense glee that he feels saying those words and <i>knowing</i> that his mom is out there and safe will not ever get old he doesn’t think. Though that glee is somewhat dampened at the fact that he wants her there so she can tell them that Isobel isn’t going crazy or spontaneously developed a tumor when they normally can’t even catch a cold.</p><p>“Is it bad of me that I’m happy for you but I’m kind of hoping that we don’t have any more family,” Isobel says, “I don’t know what we’d say to mom and dad, how do we make that choice?”</p><p>Michael is thankful he doesn’t have that problem.</p><p>The door pushes open and Max makes his way in, bag in his hand and Kyle right behind him.</p><p>“I brought you a burger, but if you get caught with it I’m disavowing all knowledge,” Max says digging into the bag to pull the wrapped burger out to hand to Michael and then pushing the rest of the bag at Isobel.</p><p>Michael doesn’t even spare him a glance, just pulls the wrapper off and breathes in the smell of greasy burger goodness, he knows that Max and Kyle and Isobel are probably all staring at him, he doesn’t care. It’s the absolute best thing he’s tasted in a while.</p><p>Max takes the wrapper when he’s done, burying it under napkins and tissues in the trashcan, though the whole room smells like the Crashdown. No one is going to be fooled.</p><p>“Do you think they’ll yell if I go back to Alex’s room now?” Michael asks, it’s been almost two hours. Long enough for Alex to not eat lunch and have a quick catnap.</p><p>“Did you nap? Or just wait for us to get back hoping we’d bring you food?” Max asks.</p><p>“Is and I were talking,” Michael says and he stares at Max hoping that he’ll get it, he thinks he does, he looks between Michael and Isobel and there’s a quick bob of his head.</p><p>They’ll talk about it later, after Kyle leaves and there’s no chance that Maria and Liz will show up, after Michael has been kicked out of Alex’s room and back to his own to have ‘restful’ sleep in his own bed.</p><p>He wonders why they didn’t just put them in the same room, it would save a lot of time and energy on Michael’s part if he just had to turn on his side to see Alex laying there.</p><p>“I’m going back to Alex’s room,” he says, “nurse said only three people should be in there at one time.”</p><p>The other three look between each other and Isobel just shrugs, “I’m going to go see if Liz or Maria has a Rosa update yet.”</p><p>Michael almost wants to groan, he doesn’t.</p><p> </p>
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</div><p> </p><p>Maria and Liz are in the hallway heads bent together, Isobel glances over at them but doesn’t move to join them.</p><p>“I’m going to…” she waves a hand vaguely and heads in the direction of the nurses’ station, Michael stares after her, when he looks at Max he sees him already looking back at him with a raised eyebrow.</p><p>Michael just shrugs because they need to talk about it, but they also need to talk about it when no one else is around unless they want their secret to be common knowledge.</p><p>He goes to take the few more steps to Alex’s door, but stops when he glances down the hallway. Kyle’s mom and the Sheriff are walking towards them, keeping close to them are his mom and David, and his case worker as well.</p><p>He can see the warning expression on the Sheriff’s face, and he can feel the pressure on his mind that is screaming at him to ask surprised, he’s <i>never</i> met them before, he doesn’t know if it’s his mom or David or someone else.</p><p>“You okay?” Max asks, touching his arm then following his gaze, Kyle right next to him and now the girls are looking over as well.</p><p>“Good, I’m glad we caught you,” his case worker steps to the forefront and she still looks barely old enough to be the one responsible for him. He doesn’t even look at her though, <i>can’t</i> seem to look away from his mom’s gentle expression and he doesn’t think he noticed how frail she looked when she was in his room.</p><p>“Mom,” he says softly, wonderingly and he knows the case worker is saying something, Maria and Liz are talking over each other as well. Max is a quiet presence at his side, Kyle right next to him. He doesn’t really see anything but his mom and he’s seen her, but it wasn’t in the bright light of day, it wasn’t standing in a hallway surrounded by his friends so he’s not having a hallucination brought on by trauma or exhaustion.</p><p>She looks over at the caseworker, like she’s asking permission to approach him and the case worker just nods. She takes the few steps closer and then her hands are touching his face and he didn’t realize he was crying until he feels her brush away the tears with callused fingers.</p><p>He swallows thickly, it’s probably audible but he can’t care when she folds him gently into her arms and presses a hand to the back of his head.</p><p>She’s humming, that same nameless tune that she’d hummed the last time he’d seen her and he cries into her shoulder, cradled in warm arms that he <i>remembers</i>.</p><p>He doesn’t know how much time has passed, enough that when he remembers he’s in public and can feel the first blush of embarrassment that she soothes away with the gentle brush of her mind against his. It feels comfortable and familiar, it’s only when he pulls away that he remembers Max and Isobel. When he turns he can see it’s been long enough that Isobel has returned.</p><p>Standing right next to Max, hands clenched tightly together both of them looking apprehensive.</p><p>“You have your mothers’ eyes,” she says quietly and Isobel’s façade cracks just a little bit as his mom leaves one arm touching his back and reaches out with the other hand to cup Isobel’s face in it. “And you,” she says to Max, smile bright.</p><p>He doesn’t know what cover story the Sheriff and Maria’s mom have come up with, just a glance at his mom shows her thin and worn, David looks the same.</p><p>But he doesn’t need to know the cover story until they tell him it because he’s not supposed to know anything more then he already knows and being locked up in a prison because they’re aliens is probably not the story they’re going to tell.</p><p> </p>
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</div><p> </p><p>“We’re going to set up some times for you to meet and get to know each other,” the caseworker says after the Sheriff has taken his mom and David away to wherever he’s hiding them out for the time being, “they’ll have to be supervised at least for the first couple as we run things up the official channels but thankfully the Sheriff has offered to supervise those visits and…”</p><p>She’s writing furiously on a pad of paper.</p><p>“A cult,” Michael says and he can’t believe they went with something so trite, though he’s not sure what would have been better.</p><p>He exchanges a look with Max who shrugs at him, Isobel has already left, going to see if she can check on Rosa. For someone professing to remember nothing about any supposed relationship with Rosa she certainly seems intent on making sure she’s okay and possibly being in the room when she finally wakes up.</p><p>He’s not sure what to make of it.</p><p>“I did some papers on cults in college,” she says absently, “they’re damn lucky they managed to get the three of you out when you were kids, just looking at them it’s easy to see that they were severely punished for it as result.”</p><p> </p>
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</div><p> </p><p>Alex is awake, him and Kyle have their heads bent together and Alex is writing in a notebook that Michael doesn’t remember him having with Kyle tapping away on his phone.</p><p>“No,” Michael says, because <i>really</i>?</p><p>“Hey,” Alex says, voice light and teasing, “I was thinking maybe you weren’t coming back today.”</p><p>“No,” he says again, shaking his head and Alex grins at him, Kyle at least stands up and moves out of his chair so he can sit next to him, he links his fingers with Alex’s and presses his lips to the back of his hand.</p><p>“We were just talking and…”</p><p>“You’re not going to investigate the cult that my mom was apparently stuck in,” Michael says, because he won’t be distracted by the fact that Alex looks really happy to see him.</p><p>“Of course not,” Alex scoffs and Michael’s shoulders relax just a little, “at least not yet, Kyle said she didn’t actually name the cult and there’s like a couple thousand in the US <i>alone</i>, so we’ll need more information before we can extrapolate which one is the most likely… why are you looking at me like that?”</p><p>Michael just stares at him in disbelief and shakes his head slowly.</p><p>“I really did think that they were kidding,” he says, he glances over at Max who is just looking resigned then over at Kyle.</p><p>“I mean we’re a little out of practice,” Kyle admits, “the M &amp; V Detective Agency basically closed up when we hit seventh grade…”</p><p>“School took a lot more time then I think we were prepared for initially,” Alex nods. “But it’s like riding a horse, it’ll take a little bit of time but we’ll get back in the swing of things…”</p><p>“I’ve got a list of questions to ask my dad, he’s probably going to give me the run around so I’ll have to be sneaky about it that’ll take a bit more time than it should,” Kyle says, he gestures at the notebook that is laying on Alex’s tray next to his water glass.</p><p>“Why would you even?” Max starts, then stops, shakes his head.</p><p>“Michael’s mom got out and she and your uncle, I guess? They alluded to the fact that Isobel’s mom was dead, but your dad might still be in there and she didn’t have any information on Max’s family at all, at least not that she talked about while I was still there…”</p><p>Kyle looks so earnest when he’s talking, Michael is still really kind of mad that he’s going to end up <i>liking</i> this guy and he’s trying really freaking hard to not be charmed by the fact that Kyle is worried that his dad and Max’s family might still be locked up in the clutches of some cult that doesn’t actually <i>exist</i>.</p><p>“I’m sure they’ve got people looking into it,” Michael says, “Probably a full complement of alphabet soups trying to figure things out.”</p><p>“Sure,” Alex nods, “but are they really going to share any of that information with you?”</p><p>Michael just blinks at him, because he’s got a point, but there’s also no cult to investigate and he doesn’t really want Alex or Kyle drawing the interest of whatever prospective one might end up at the top of their radar.</p><p> </p>
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<a name="section0019"><h2>19. Book 3: Chapter 19</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>POV Change. :)</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <b>Legacies 19/?</b><br/>
</p><p>The days are blending together for Alex, there’s really no change between one to the next.</p><p>He gets woken up by a nurse or orderly in the morning; his breakfast tray with food that he doesn’t want to eat, not even to appease his doctors, will arrive while someone is running through a checklist of questions on how he feels and how he slept and what his pain levels are at.</p><p>His pain levels are fine, he feels like he should be in <i>more</i> pain then he is.</p><p>He’s not and he’s been half terrified that the fact that he’s not in more pain means that he’s actually lost the ability to <i>tell</i> when he’s in pain.</p><p>He’s pretended to be asleep while the doctors go through his injuries with his mom and he knows that he’s lucky to even be alive. That if Kyle’s dad had been maybe an hour later in finding him that he might have not been.</p><p>Michael will normally appear while he’s dawdling and not eating his breakfast, someone usually in tow behind him.</p><p>He’s actually surprised when he wakes up on what he <i>thinks</i> is twelfth morning in the hospital, there were a couple of days where he was apparently unconscious and he’s not gotten a definitive answer on how many days that <i>actually</i> was; he opens his eyes and there’s no nurse or orderly or breakfast tray or Michael.</p><p>
 There’s Greg sitting slouched in the chair that normally Michael occupies tapping on his phone; when Alex glances at the window he can see that the blinds to his room are partially open showing it’s still dark out.
</p><p>
  “Why aren’t you home sleeping?” he asks and Greg looks up at him in surprise.
</p><p>
 “Hey,” he says softly, his big brother voice that Alex hasn’t heard in what feels like forever, “You in pain? We can call someone?”
</p><p>
  Alex lays there, thinks, stares at his brother and shakes his head.
</p><p>
“Just the usual,” he says and Greg snorts and rolls his eyes.
</p><p>
“The usual for you is probably agony for anyone else little brother,” Greg says, he fumbles for the call button laying next to Alex’s hand and presses it.
</p><p>
 Alex just watches him, if he’d thought about which of his brothers would actually show up at his bedside he doesn’t think Greg would have been on that list.
</p><p>
He’s not sure <i>any</i> of his brothers would have been, maybe Flint at one point but even right before he’d left for basic training he’d been more and more like dad.
</p><p>
 “Why aren’t you sleeping?” Alex presses and Greg sighs at him.
</p><p>
“Mom and I agreed one of us would stay at least in the hospital with you, if not in the room with you, she was looking a little pale so,” Greg shrugs, “seems a shame to be spending the money on hotel room when it’s never getting used, we’re switching off until they release you.”
</p><p>
 “Why aren’t you staying at the house?”
</p><p>
 Greg and Clay’s room is exactly the same as it was left when they left, maybe a few little things missing that he and Flint had taken when they were missing their big brothers.
</p><p>
 But it still had two beds in it and he’s sure once the sheets were washed it would have been a suitable place to sleep in.
</p><p>
  Greg is just staring at him, and Alex blinks, not quite understanding why he look so baffled.
</p><p>
 The nurse comes in distracting them for a few minutes, running through her questions and giving him a shot, patting him on the arm like he’s a small child.
</p><p>
 “Couple more days and we’ll probably start weening you off some of these,” she says cheerfully and Alex winces. That’s not going to be fun for any of them he’s sure.
</p><p>
 “Greg?” he says when the nurse leaves, the door closing with a quiet click behind her.
</p><p>
 “The house is a crime scene right now,” Greg says, he’s not looking at him, rubbing his palms against his thighs and scowling. “The house, the toolshed out back… it’s all cordoned off and I wouldn’t want to stay there or go back in until mom has someone come down and clean the place anyway.”
</p><p>
 “The house?” Alex frowns, he remembers the toolshed and… he shakes his head, remembers the terror in Michael’s voice, in his, his father’s angry loud voice, though thankfully nothing specific.
</p><p>
 “Don’t,” Greg says, reaching out to touch his arm, squeezing gently, “it’s probably a blessing you don’t remember anything that happened in the house, I’ve only seen a couple of the pictures by accident and kind of wish I hadn’t.”
</p><p>
  I don’t remember going in the house,” Alex says slowly, he remembers his dad hitting him, remembers Michael so still on the ground and fighting to try and get back to him, that he needed help and…
</p><p>
 “You won’t go back there again, you need anything from there I’ll get it, or mom will get it or the Sheriff will likely clean out anything we want before he bulldozes the whole thing to the ground which is what he’s threatening to do family property or not,” Greg states.
</p><p>
Alex leans his head back, stares at the ceiling, tries not to think about how badly he does <i>not</i> want to remember what happened in any more detail then he already does.
</p><p>
 He can see the evidence in the mirror when he chooses to look and he’s trying to not think about how badly his dad must hate him.
</p><p>
 "What do you know about cults in the US?” Alex asks, desperate to change the subject and from the loud laugh that almost sounds like a bark Greg obviously didn’t expect it.
</p><p>
“Is the M &amp; V Detective Agency back in business?” Greg asks with amusement.
</p><p>
  Well I won’t be in the bed forever…” Alex says, and it was the last thing that he and Kyle had ever really agreed on before high school totally tore apart whatever friendship they had.
</p><p>
Maybe the resurrection of the M &amp; V Detective Agency will be just the thing to get them back to the friends they were before everything went to shit.
</p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p> ********************************</p>
</div><p> </p><p>He’s not actually sure what he’s watching, the TV has been low since Greg left and mom peeked her head in to reaffirm that he’s still among the living.</p><p>Michael comes in after the breakfast tray has been taken away looking equal parts disgruntled and annoyed.</p><p>“X-rays on the hand first thing this morning,” Michael says after he pulls the chair Greg had been sitting in closer to the bed, Alex catches his good hand before he sits down, tugging him close and smiling up at him.</p><p>Michael grins back down at him, then realizes that they are <i>alone</i> in the room and leans down to press a quick soft kiss against his lips.</p><p>He’s smiling gently at him and Alex doesn’t even want to know what expression is on his face because he probably looks completely besotted and a little silly.</p><p>He doesn’t care, not really.</p><p>His dad is gone, him and Michael are both okay (or will be, eventually) and considering his mom had been trying to covertly help him out with the financial aid stuff for college there’s no way she’s going to frog march him down the enlistment center the way his dad had been threatening to do so after graduation.</p><p>“I’m surprised Max and Kyle aren’t in here bugging you already,” Michael says, leaning over just enough that he rest his head against the bed and Alex can drag his fingers through his hair.</p><p>“No, just Greg this morning and then mom popped in to make sure I was still alive, you were the first person apart from them, are they really friends now? I mean…”</p><p>“If they’re not friends, they’re certainly doing a good job faking us all out,” Michael grumbles and Alex grins, he really still wants to hate on Kyle for the way that he treated Alex and Alex gets it.</p><p>He does, because he’s bore the brunt end of Kyle’s bad behavior for years, but Kyle’s also been his best friend since he was old enough to know that best friends were a thing and he misses the kid that he used to trade choose your own adventure mystery books with.</p><p>The boy that he found missing cats and dogs and that one time that little boy that hadn’t been missing long enough to raise any alarms, he’d just got lost and scared then sat down in the middle of a bunch of bushes because he was lost and scared but also not supposed to talk to any grownups that he didn’t know so he didn’t know how to find his way without asking for help.</p><p>“I found them,” Kyle says pushing through the door, Max is right behind looking bemused and Alex can see in his hands the notebook with the questions they’d come up with and taped to the cover a crumpled faded card with their old logo on it.</p><p>He hands the notebook over and Alex runs his fingers over the card, they can certainly come up with a better one now, they’re not kids anymore.</p><p>“I sketched out a couple last night,” Kyle says with a shrug and Alex flips the notebook open, Kyle’s made some notes next to their questions that he’ll have to come back to. The next couple of pages are all variations of their old logo, some colored in with pencil and markers.</p><p>“I think there’s a drawing program on my computer,” Alex says, “I’ll put a couple of them in and we’ll play around with them.”</p><p>Alex flips back to the page with the questions they came up with and Kyle’s idly been talking about wanting to be a doctor of some sort since they were kids, he’s definitely got the handwriting for it. Most of his scrawling is illegible.</p><p>“Dad was being all squirrely about things,” Kyle says, flopping down in the empty chair near Max, slouching in a way that’s probably going to end up fucking up his back something awful.</p><p>“You think he knows more about things then he alluded to?”</p><p>“Maybe,” Kyle shrugs, “I don’t know, I’d think he was involved in it somehow with the way he was dancing around the specifics, but he’s been too busy to be part of some cult… plus don’t you think we’d notice?”</p><p>Alex sighs, he’s sure there’s more going on here than just Michael’s mom and uncle escaping from some cult, but he’s equally sure that he doesn’t have all the pieces he needs to put that puzzle together.</p><p> </p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p> ********************************</p>
</div><p> </p><p> </p><p>
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</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0020"><h2>20. Book 3: Chapter 20</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <b>Legacies 20/?</b><br/>
</p>
<p>Maria and Liz are the first to appear at his door after his breakfast tray is taken away. He’s not happy about his appetite coming back and the same bland, boring food appearing on each of his meal trays but he’s hopeful that finishing them off will mean moving onto something better tasting.</p>
<p>“You’re not Michael,” is the first thing that pops out of his mouth and he flushes as both girls laugh at him.</p>
<p>“Should probably be annoyed that you would rather see your boyfriend then us, but can’t quite find the energy this morning,” Liz shrugs.</p>
<p>“You look tired,” Alex says, Maria pulls another chair up beside the one that Michael normally occupies. “Everything okay?”</p>
<p>“Rosa woke up a couple hours ago,” Maria says, her and Liz are kind of leaning into each other. “She had a panic attack when they started asking her questions about what happened.”</p>
<p>“Is she okay?” Alex asks, he fingers the blanket and thinks about tossing them back and trying to bully one of them into helping him walk down to Rosa’s room so he can make sure she’s okay.</p>
<p>“They sedated her,” Liz says quietly. “My dad is in with her now, she already knew about the Sheriff being her <i>actual</i> dad, said mom told her.”</p>
<p>Alex looks at her, at her face drawn with exhaustion, heavy circles under her eyes.</p>
<p>“She never said anything? Even hinted at it?” he asks softly and Liz shakes her head.</p>
<p>“She says it doesn’t matter, that dad is dad; but she also said the Sheriff was the one that helped her get clean, talked her into going to meetings and trying… it kind of sounds like maybe <i>he</i> didn’t know until Rosa found out?” Liz’s voice cracks. “Just reason number 5 million and ten why our mom sucks so bad.”</p>
<p>“Why don’t you go home and get some sleep?” Alex says, “Or go to Maria’s and sleep there,” he gestures at her face, “your bags have bags upon bags.”</p>
<p>“Don’t waste your breath, Alex,” Maria sighs. “I already tried.”</p>
<p>“I’m not leaving until Papa leaves,” Liz says firmly, trying to glare at both of them though it softens when it reaches Alex still in his hospital bed. “Plus we told Michael we would stay here until him and Kyle got back.”</p>
<p>Alex looks between them in alarm, “why…?” he starts and Maria reaches out to touch his arm.</p>
<p>“They released him this morning, so Kyle’s mom took them both to the house to get Michael settled in, they’ll be back about lunchtime, Max went with them but I’m sure Michael will keep them focused on getting back if for no other reason than Michael was worried that you would be worried when he didn’t show up this morning.”</p>
<p>“I’ve never thought about what kind of boyfriend Michael Guerin would be, but I’m going to warn you that he’s got all the earmarks of the overprotective boyfriend type,” Liz says, she’s leaning back in her chair staring blankly at the ceiling.</p>
<p>“We took a quiz on your behalf,” Maria says when Alex just blinks at her.</p>
<p>“How did you even know how to answer the questions?”</p>
<p>“Well we took your half then Isobel grudgingly took Michael’s half, Max agreed with her answers and Kyle just seemed baffled by the entire thing,” Maria grins.</p>
<p>Alex still feels confused, he’s not sure why it would matter, and he’s known Maria and Liz long enough that Maria clocks what he’s thinking pretty damn quick.</p>
<p>“This,” she gestures to encompass the entire room which Alex takes to mean his being in a hospital bed, “is to never happen again, but we also wanted to make sure that you were going to be taken care of in case it <i>does</i>.”</p>
<p>“Despite what it looks like right now, you know I can take care of myself,” Alex says softly, picking at the edge of the blanket and not looking at either of them.</p>
<p>“Of course you can,” Maria squeezes his arm until he looks at her, “but you shouldn’t always need to.” He looks at her and she smiles gently at him looking older and wiser than her eighteen years, “it’s okay to lean on someone else sometimes too.”</p>
<p>“So what’s going on with you and Kyle?” he asks Liz, desperate to change the subject to something <i>not</i> revolving around him and Michael. “Or you and Max?” he pauses and tilts his head to the side, because… “Or Kyle and Max?”</p>
<p>Maria smirks and raises an eyebrow as they both focus their attention on Liz. Who just shrugs and slouches down a little in her chair like she’s attempting to disappear through the floor, he could tell her it won’t work, he’s tried numerous times in the past.</p>
<p>“Nothing,” Liz mutters, “there is absolutely nothing going on; Kyle and I are talking again, Max and I are talking, I’m talking to both of them together, but…”</p>
<p>“She’s worried about the expectations of society as a whole and gender rules and norms and is freaking out that it’s selfish if she kind of wants both of them and doesn’t want to have to choose even though neither of them have even made mention of the situation. Then she got worried that maybe they’ve decided they want to date each other instead and neither one of them wants to talk to her about because they don’t want to hurt her feelings with her sister being in the hospital,” Maria says gleefully.</p>
<p>“Maria,” Liz groans.</p>
<p>“That’s what you said.”</p>
<p>“I never said a single solitary word about societal norms or gender rules,” Liz grumbles.</p>
<p>“No, you just talked for six hours about how it wasn’t fair that Kyle finally decided to <i>stop</i> being an actual jock jackass just as you realized that Max wasn’t just another boy at school and how it wasn’t fair that you had to choose and what even were they finding to talk about in all that time they spend with each other and why is Max looking at Kyle like he used to look at you? I’m kind of surprised Rosa didn’t wake up just to tell you to shut the fuck up,” Maria grins.</p>
<p>“I honestly don’t think Kyle has even <i>noticed</i> that Max is looking at him any differently,” Alex offers and Liz rolls her eyes.</p>
<p>“That actually doesn’t help as much as you would think.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p> ********************************</p>
</div><p> </p>
<p>Alex convinces Liz and Maria to leave when they bring his lunch tray and Liz looks intrigued enough by what’s on it that he’s worried he might need to fight her for food that he doesn’t <i>actually</i> want to eat.</p>
<p>“But Michael said,” she says and Alex waves his hand at her and points towards the door.</p>
<p>“Go eat something that is actually probably edible and has some calories, I’m a big boy, I can amuse myself until someone comes back.”</p>
<p>If anything, he’ll turn the TV on and watch some trashy TV with the volume off.</p>
<p>Liz looks torn but Maria herds her out with a wink tossed in his direction.</p>
<p>Alex does eat some of his food, the bread is a little soggy but at least it’s not the oatmeal with no flavor that he’s been getting for breakfast.</p>
<p>He doodles on the pad of paper and desperately wishes for his phone or a computer. He doesn’t even know where his phone is, and no one has mentioned it. Not even in passing. It’s fairly new too, there’s no way his dad… and his brain stutters to a stop and he takes a breath, another one.</p>
<p>Doesn’t think any more about his phone or his dad and fumbles for the TV remote to turn it on to whatever nonsense was the last thing he was watching.</p>
<p>He breathes and doesn’t think and watches a bright talk show with the volume off where a man throws a chair and the woman wearing barely any clothes bursts into tears.</p>
<p>“What the hell are you watching?” Michael asks from the door and Alex startles, he hadn’t even <i>heard</i> the door open. But Michael is standing there in jeans and a t-shirt that Alex is almost positive is Kyle’s.</p>
<p>Kyle is peering over his shoulder, there is no sign of Max.</p>
<p>“Something,” Alex says, pressing the button to turn the TV off and returning his attention to where Michael and Kyle are now standing shoulder to shoulder right inside the door.</p>
<p>“Is that Kyle’s shirt?” he asks, waving a hand at the clothes that Michael is currently wearing that are definitely <i>not</i> something that Michael would ever wear.</p>
<p>Michael glances down at himself and looks a little sheepish.</p>
<p>“His case worker brought over a bag of stuff from the last foster home and there were no clothes in there, not even some random t-shirt,” Kyle says, “so Michael had to tell her he wasn’t <i>actually</i> living there and then <i>why</i> he wasn’t living there and then she got really pissed; someone’s getting a strongly worded e-mail or a nasty phone call and likely is never going to foster another kid again.”</p>
<p>Alex focuses on Michael and it suddenly hits him that Michael was living out of his truck, that when Alex had offered up the tool shed as a place to stay and Michael had taken him up on that offer, that he’d likely moved some of his belongings in there and probably never got the opportunity to move them back out.</p>
<p>Not before it all went to hell and the tool shed and his house became crime scenes; it’ll be near impossible to get anything from there until they’re done processing them for evidence.</p>
<p>Alex kind of doesn’t want to step a toe in either place again.</p>
<p>He can see the evidence of his father’s violence on his and Michael’s skin, and while he kind of wants to know what happened… he also <i>doesn’t</i> want to remember all the events he’s apparently forgotten that wound him up in the hospital bed.</p>
<p>“The sheriff knows, he said he try and get me anything that wasn’t being considered evidence,” Michael says, coming over to the side of the bed and pressing a sweet kiss to the side of his mouth. Alex smiles at him and ignore Kyle watching and looking all sorts of bemused.</p>
<p>“Mom and I are taking him and his mom shopping this weekend,” Kyle says, pulling the chair Maria had been sitting in away so it’s not <i>right</i> next to Michael and slouching down it. “Maybe his uncle too, it wasn’t <i>real</i> clear who all was coming and I think mom is all the more the merrier because she’s completely using this as a distraction from the Rosa situation and my dad not telling her he had a secret kid with Liz’s mom.”</p>
<p>Alex looks at him and Kyle doesn’t say anything else, just quirks his lips and Alex nods. Michael looks between them with narrowed eyes but doesn’t say anything.</p>
<p>“Liz and Maria said they were going to stay with you,” Michael says, he pointedly doesn’t look around the room that doesn’t contain Liz or Maria at the moment.</p>
<p>“They went to get lunch, and then possibly Maria is going to convince Liz to sleep for ten minutes or something,” Alex shrugs.</p>
<p>Michael raises an eyebrow at him and Alex just arches his back.</p>
<p>“The hospital is filled nurses, doctors and orderlies and probably at least one deputy the current situations being what they are. If I need help with anything I can press the call button on my gadget thing and I’ve been using a remote with ease since I was five, maybe four if my brothers left me alone with it long enough.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p> ********************************</p>
</div><p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <a id="cutid1-end" name="cutid1-end"></a>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0021"><h2>21. Book 3: Chapter 21</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <b>Legacies 21/?</b><br/>
</p>
<p>“Rosa finally calmed down enough so they could try and get a statement this morning supposedly,” Kyle says when he and Michael appear the next morning.</p>
<p>“Aren’t you supposed to be in school?” Alex asks, Tuesday is written on the white board along with his nurse’s (Abby) name, date and a smiley face wearing a hat with a flower coming out of the top of it.</p>
<p>“My mom called the school, told the secretary something about how it would be good for my mental health, and Michael’s since he’s now staying with us to have a few days to have some time to process everything,” Kyle shrugs but Alex is already focusing on Michael who is pulling the chair close to the bed and linking their fingers together, brushing a kiss against the back of his knuckles.</p>
<p>“Hi,” he says softly, squeezing Michael’s hand gently.</p>
<p>“Visiting hours suck,” Michael says and Alex grins at him.</p>
<p>“You didn’t really miss anything, they’ve upgraded my breakfast from oatmeal to some kind of egg scramble thing that still sucks, and Greg and I got to do laps this morning to prove that I can move around of my own volition,” Alex tilts his head at him and Michael rubs their joined hands against his cheek. “They’ll probably release <i>me</i> soon.”</p>
<p>“Don’t you think that’s really quick?” Kyle asks, he’s pulled his chair next to, but not too close to Michael’s and is slouching back in it. “I feel like that’s too fast, maybe I should have my mom talk to someone.”</p>
<p>“Don’t you dare,” Alex says and Kyle looks at him with his worried eyes that Alex hasn’t seen since they were kids and Alex fell out of the haphazard tree house structure they built when they were nine and begged Kyle to not tell his dad, because his dad had already told him they <i>couldn’t</i> build it and he did not want to get into trouble.</p>
<p>They were probably really lucky that he didn’t break anything and the bruises and scrapes were easily explained away.</p>
<p>“I know the chances of going back to the house are probably slim to none considering, but I will take a hotel bed over this hospital bed any day.”</p>
<p>“Well my mom and your mom were taking about apartments and stuff, so I’m pretty sure they’re on top of things,” Kyle offers.</p>
<p>“No Max again?” Alex raises an eyebrow, Michael’s lips quirk into a smirk and Kyle just looks confused.</p>
<p>“Him and Isobel got here the same time we did,” Kyle says he sounds so earnest, like <i>Alex</i> is actually worried about Max being there or something, “Isobel wanted to see if she could maybe see Rosa and Max went with her just in case Rosa doesn’t actually know her or something.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p> ********************************</p>
</div><p> </p>
<p>“How did you even get this?” Alex asks when Maria drops the sketch on the table by his bed and rolls her eyes at the way that Kyle eagerly leans forward to see it.</p>
<p>“Dad didn’t even say they were going to have a sketch artist sit with her,” he says as Alex turns it over so he can see it.</p>
<p>“Because they haven’t yet, Liz brought her a sketchbook because, you know, Rosa, she did it last night because she couldn’t sleep or something,” Maria shrugs, she perches on the corner of Alex’s bed.</p>
<p>“I don’t recognize him,” Alex says as Kyle shakes his head, Michael has his head cocked to the side as he studies the drawing.</p>
<p>“He looks familiar?” he finally says, he squints at the drawing like maybe that’ll help him figure it out, “like maybe I’ve seen him in passing or something?”</p>
<p>“I said the same thing,” Max says from where he’s hovering behind Kyle one hand resting against the back of his chair, he’d followed Maria in and Kyle had flashed him a quick easy grin and Alex did <i>not</i> say a word about the way Max’s cheeks had flushed in response.</p>
<p>Alex doesn’t think Kyle has noticed how close Max is, though maybe he has since even when Kyle settles back in his chair Max doesn’t move his hand and Kyle doesn’t react to Max’s hand being there.</p>
<p>And Kyle can be oblivious about some things, but there is no way he can’t feel Max’s hand pressing against his back.</p>
<p>Alex doesn’t make eye contact with Maria who he knows well enough to know she’s <i>itching</i> to say something; and he can see Michael out of the corner of his visibly biting his lip, probably to keep <i>himself</i> from asking ‘what the ever loving fuck?’</p>
<p>“I forgot how good she was,” Kyle says, “she definitely didn’t get that from dad, his idea of artwork is a stick figure.”</p>
<p>“I think that was your idea of art as well,” Alex rolls his eyes.</p>
<p>“Hey, I managed a couple of really good crappy flowers before the guidance counselors told me I didn’t have to take it if I didn’t want to,” Kyle says defensively. “Mom used to put them on the fridge and everything.”</p>
<p>“I think moms are required by mom laws to display crappy artwork,” Maria says.</p>
<p>Alex doesn’t say anything since his mom had been gone for long enough that he doesn’t remember her hanging any artwork crappy or otherwise on their fridge, though likely his dad who didn’t like clutter of any sort would have shot that down pretty damn quick even if she <i>had</i> still been around.</p>
<p>“My mom used to hang ours up,” Max says quietly, Kyle twists his head to nod approvingly at him and Alex watches Michael roll his eyes but still not say anything.</p>
<p> </p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p> ********************************</p>
</div><p> </p>
<p>Max wanders off with Kyle to find Liz and Isobel to get lunch.</p>
<p>“We can bring something back,” Kyle offers as Max is heading out the door and Alex is completely not ashamed of the way he beams and nods enthusiastically at the offer before rattling off his order that he’s sure Kyle already knows.</p>
<p>“I’m sure your doctors are not okay with that,” Michael says as Maria settles into the chair that Kyle had vacated.</p>
<p>“I don’t even care, I want one of Arturo’s shakes even if Arturo is probably not the one making them, and it is worth getting yelled at if I can even drink half of it,” he can just about taste the shake and fries and the grease of the burger.</p>
<p>“He’s got to know, right? I mean no one is <i>that</i> oblivious, right?” Maria asks, staring at the door that Max and Kyle had disappeared through.</p>
<p>“Do you remember how long it took before he realized that Liz was flirting with him?” Alex asks and Maria waves a hand at him.</p>
<p>“We’re not in eighth grade anymore,” she says and Alex snorts.</p>
<p>“I mean we’ve just really started talking again, but he doesn’t seem to be that much more self-aware then he was when we were as kids,” Alex shrugs.</p>
<p>“I guess,” Maria sighs.</p>
<p>“So tell me what’s happening with Rosa?” Alex asks, Michael’s fingers tighten around his slightly.</p>
<p>“Only if it’s friend Alex and not detective Alex asking,” Maria asks with a suspicious tinge to her voice.</p>
<p>“They’re the same person, but we both want to know if one of my best friends is going to be okay?”</p>
<p>Maria leans forward in her chair, then using the heels of her boots drags herself and her chair closer to Alex’s bed so she can lean an elbow against it.</p>
<p>“They say she’s going to be okay, she doesn’t remember much, just this guy coming at them and everything else seems spotty. She only really remembers dragging him off Kate after he’d already killed Jasmine. She doesn’t remember getting Kate in the car, doesn’t remember the crash or anything.”</p>
<p>“Well the therapist that I’m supposed to talk to says that’s not necessarily a bad thing,” Alex offers and Maria shoots a wan smile in his direction.</p>
<p>“I guess, she said Isobel was supposed to meet her and never showed up…”</p>
<p>“I didn’t hear that,” Michael says and his fingers are gripping Alex’s tight, all his attention focused on Maria.</p>
<p>Maria shrugs, “Isobel seemed kind of surprised as well, but there was a lot going on then,” she waves her hand at the two of them, “she probably just forgot all about it.”</p>
<p>Alex glances over at Michael who doesn’t look like he buys Isobel forgetting about meeting Rosa, and for that matter he doesn’t know Isobel near as well as he knows Michael or Maria or Liz or even Kyle or Max.</p>
<p>But she doesn’t really strike him as the type that ‘forgets’ things. She strikes him as the type that keeps multiple planners with detailed lists of where she needs to be and who she’s meeting with.</p>
<p> </p>
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p> ********************************</p>
</div><p> </p>
<p>Michael is taken away by a very apologetic Kyle when visiting hours end.</p>
<p>“My mom will <i>absolutely</i> come get us if we’re not home when they expect us to be,” he says as he herds Michael towards the door and Alex makes a face because that’s totally true.</p>
<p>“I could just…” Michael starts and Kyle shakes his head.</p>
<p>“They are not going to let you stay, not now that you’ve been released,” he says and Michael looks vastly unsettled by this fact which kind of makes Alex want to grin because it seems to have taken no time at all to get used to having Michael at arm’s reach most of the time.</p>
<p>“I’m literally going to sleep,” Alex says. “Probably talk to my mom or Greg depending on which one of them is going to be hanging out with me tonight.”</p>
<p>Michael is still grumbling as Kyle pulls him out of the room and Alex reaches for the remote as the silence of the room starts to press in on him.</p>
<p>His mom has peeked in twice, disappearing once she knew that he had people in his room making sure he stayed occupied. He hasn’t seen Greg since that morning when they’d walked slowly up and down the hallway. He’s still not quite sure what the point of that had been, though his nurse had looked approving when they’d finished the fourth turn.</p>
<p>Being alone in the hospital sucks, he’d been expecting his mom or Greg to reappear once everyone else had been sent home for the night and he’s trying to not let the little flare of hurt grow into anger that he’s all alone.</p>
<p>He must fall asleep at some point because when he wakes up the room is mostly dark, the blinds have been drawn. When he turns his head to the right to see if mom or Greg is with him tonight he finds it’s neither of them, Mimi has his remote in hand and is flipping through the channels on his TV slowly.</p>
<p>“Where’s…” he starts and Mimi turns her head towards him and smiles softly.</p>
<p>“Your brother is probably passed out in a hotel room, your mom and Jim are dealing with some other stuff but they’ll be back soon I’m sure.”</p>
<p>Alex swallows thickly and tries to think of the things that his mom and the Sheriff could be dealing with that don’t revolve around his dad, he can’t think of anything.</p>
<p>“Your father is still safely ensconced in military holding,” Mimi says, she reaches out to brush her hand against Alex’s arm. “This is not anything to do with your dad or you…”</p>
<p>“Then why…”</p>
<p>“They found a body under the toolshed,” she says finally.</p>
<p>Alex just stares at her, opens his mouth to ask questions and can’t actually figure out <i>what</i> to ask her.</p>
<p>“A body?” he asks faintly, that can’t be right, he heard her wrong… he’s slept in the toolshed pretty regularly on and off for almost two years, Michael stayed in it for months, they had sex in the toolshed and Alex is pretty sure they would notice the smell of a decaying body directly under their <i>feet</i>.</p>
<p>“It’s more a skeleton then a body,” Mimi says, head tilting to the side as she watches him. “They haven’t released any ID on him yet but Jim thinks it might be your great-grandfather’s brother.”</p>
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<a name="section0022"><h2>22. Book 3: Chapter 22</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <b>Legacies 22/?</b><br/>
</p><p>Mimi is gone the next time that Alex wakes, instead Greg is slouched in the chair looking pale and drawn.</p><p>He’s always known his dad hated him, hated him for being different, for not wanting to follow in his footsteps like his brothers had.</p><p>Hated him for wanting to forge his own path in the world, not settle into one that he hasn’t ever wanted before.</p><p>He’d never in a million years thought that hatred would lead to his dad trying to kill him, to <i>almost</i> succeed in killing him.</p><p>“Did they actually ID the body?” he asks softly and Greg blinks at him in incomprehension for a moment before his expression clears.</p><p>“I’m going to assume someone told you and not that you’ve spontaneously developed psychic abilities while laying in this bed,” Greg says. Alex rolls his eyes but doesn’t indicate where he heard about it</p><p>“Dog tags say it was Uncle Tripp, or great grand uncle Tripp if we want to be technical about it.”</p><p>“Do we know how long he’s been there?” Alex asks, he’s trying to not think about sleeping in that toolshed, having <i>Michael</i> sleep there. His dad <i>can’t</i> have known or he would have more inclined to keep them out of it.</p><p>“Long enough that there was no smell, or we would have known he was there,” Greg says, “mom and the Sheriff have been trying to figure out when the shed went up, popular theory seems to be that it was built after the fact to hide the body specifically.”</p><p>“So at least dad isn’t a serial killer?” Alex says and Greg huffs a laugh.</p><p>“No just a child abuser and attempted murderer,” Greg scrubs a hand over his face. “Clay is still being an absolute asshole; says that dad wouldn’t do this even with the evidence to the contrary. But Flint is coming at the end of the week, think it finally sunk in that this actually happened.”</p><p> </p>
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</div><p> </p><p>Greg does his laps with him, by some unspoken agreement they don't talk about anything to do with dad or Clay or about the body in the toolshed which means they don't really talk at all.</p><p>The silence isn't heavy though, it's quiet and calm which Alex is okay with.</p><p>"When are you supposed to go back?" Alex asks when they're on their fourth pass of his empty room.</p><p>Greg is silent for long enough that Alex looks over at him in confusion.</p><p>"I'm supposed to sign my papers to re-up in a couple of weeks," Greg finally says, "but I've been talking to mom about maybe not doing that, with dad being, you know... well it doesn't really seem imperative to stay in."</p><p>"You could go back to school," Alex offers and Greg sighs.</p><p>“I thought about that, and mom suggested it but I didn’t even really want to do college after high school; not that it was an option,” Greg mutters. It’s the first time Alex has <i>ever</i> heard Greg sound anything but positive about joining the military. He’d not been super young when Greg and Clay had left but he’d never heard them discuss anything but joining up once they were done with school, they’d never talking about doing anything else.</p><p>“We can make a list,” Alex says, “there has to be <i>something</i> else you wanted to be.”</p><p>“I wanted to be a pirate captain, though I’m pretty sure that doesn’t count and is not a valid career choice,” Greg says with a smirk and a wink, “main reason I went into the Navy in the first place.”</p><p> </p>
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</div><p> </p><p>Kyle appears in his room by himself, no Michael in tow, Max following along behind them.</p><p>“They found a body in your tool shed,” he announces, slightly out of a breath.</p><p>“<i>Under</i> the tool shed,” Alex corrects, he glances at the door and there’s still Michael.</p><p>“He’s coming, he’s bringing his mom because he wants to introduce her to you,” Kyle makes a face. “I’ll make myself scarce, go hang out in the cafeteria or something so we don’t get yelled at for having too many people in the room.”</p><p>“You told him, didn’t you?” Michael is saying when he pushes the door open, there’s an older woman with hair cropped close to her head coming in behind him.</p><p>They have the same mouth and the arch of their noses are near identical, she looks fragile and broken and any thought of asking her questions about the cult she’d escaped from die in his throat.</p><p>There’s a sort of quiet resiliency in her stance and the way she holds herself, she <i>looks</i> like a strong wind would blow her away.</p><p>Kyle ducks out the door, not responding to Michael before he does so.</p><p>“This is Alex,” Michael says, linking their hands together and squeezing gently, Alex kind of feels like he should stand, like being in the bed in the hospital might give her the wrong impression of him somehow.</p><p>“It’s very nice to meet you,” she says softly, there’s a faint lyrical quality to her voice, just enough of an accent that she doesn’t sound strictly American, but Alex can’t place it.</p><p>Her eyes are gentle and kind, though there’s an edge of sadness in them. She stands next to Michael and doesn’t look down at their joined hands, just stares at him like she can see inside him.</p><p>Her lips curl up the tiniest bit, almost identical to the one that graces Michael’s face when he’s trying not to smile.</p><p>“It’s very nice to meet you,” she says and her smile is kind and gentle.</p><p>Michael squeezes his fingers gently and then let’s go, walking the couple of steps to grab the second chair that always seems to end up by the window when Alex is sleeping during the night. He drags it close to his and his mom sits down, legs folded together and crossed at the ankle.</p><p>“I won’t stay too long,” she says, “but David wanted to speak to Isobel and Michael wanted to introduce me to you though he’s been telling me stories about you since I found him again.”</p><p>Alex glances over at where Michael is flushing slightly.</p><p>“Nothing bad,” Michael says, “just you know that you offered me someplace to sleep when…” he makes a face and his mom’s face goes stiff and Alex can’t tell if she’s angry or sad or some mixture of both.</p><p>“I’m sorry it didn’t end up being as safe as I’d thought it was,” Alex mutters, he grips the thin blanket between his fingers and only relaxes when Michael lays his hand over his stilling his movements.</p><p>“You didn’t know, not sure how I feel knowing that I was sleeping over some dead guy though,” Michael mutters and Alex has to grin at the look of annoyance on his face.</p><p>Even though he <i>totally</i> understands, he’d slept in that shed on and off for years, to know that he was sleeping over a literal skeleton is not something that he thinks he’s going to get over any time soon.</p><p> </p>
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</div><p> </p><p>Michael’s mom, Nora, leaves with an older gentleman that doesn’t look anything like Michael and Kyle’s mom.</p><p>“Are we sure he’s your uncle?” Alex asks staring after them.</p><p>Michael rolls his eyes and doesn’t respond, Kyle is back in the other chair, slouched down, feet perched on the bars of Alex’s bed with a magazine he’s not reading laying open across his legs. He’s got his elbows propped up on the arms of the chair, fingers steepled together as he stares at the door.</p><p>“You okay?” Alex asks and Kyle jerks, like he’d forgotten Alex and Michael were in the room with him.</p><p>“Yeah, I’m…” Kyle’s mouth twists and he stops speaking. “Is Max acting weirder than usual?” he finally asks. Alex just stares at him then realizes that Kyle is actually talking to Michael.</p><p>“Not any weirder than usual,” Michael finally says, “why?”</p><p>“I don’t know,” Kyle shrugs and Alex narrows his eyes, he’s completely lying, Alex can tell because they’ve known each since they were crawling around as toddlers and he <i>knows</i> that when Kyle lies his left eye twitches. “It’s just we were talking before when your uncle was talking to Isobel, and Michael had his mom in here and we were just,  you know, hanging out outside Rosa’s room… he’s being a lot nicer than usual…” he says, his mouth snaps shut and Alex knows there’s more to it than that.</p><p>Kyle is looking shifty and like he’s thinking very seriously about just bolting from the room.</p><p>“I know where you live,” Alex says, “and I won’t be confined to this hospital forever…”</p><p>Kyle sighs, feet falling to the floor with a thump as he leans his head back so he can stare at the ceiling instead of making eye contact with Alex or Michael.</p><p>“He’s always hated me,” he says, arms crossing over his chest defensively. “And I got that, I was a giant dick and I was dating Liz when he has that huge crush on her; but Liz and me are trying to be friends because we’re pretty sure we’re not related by blood or anything but we also don’t want to open that can of worms until maybe my dad or her dad says something first. He’s really got no reason to be like getting me coffee or inviting me to the movies with him and Liz.”</p><p>“He doesn’t hate you,” Michael says, he sounds annoyed by that fact and Alex doesn’t laugh at him.</p><p>“Maybe he realized that jock Kyle didn’t actually exist,” Alex says softly and Kyle looks at him.</p><p>“Jock Kyle was a huge asshole and he burned a lot of bridges and ended up being friends with guys he didn’t <i>really</i> like, but he did exist,” Kyle says.</p><p>“Well my dad might have ended up being a piece of shit and possibly one murder away from being an actual serial killer but he taught us how to fix things with duct tape and rope, we can probably fix most of those bridges.”</p><p>“And to bring this back to something not murder related, because we agreed on the way here that we weren’t going to talk about murder or cults,” Michael is glaring at Kyle, Kyle seems to be ignoring him though, “I think I can pretty confidently say that you and Ortecho aren’t related by blood, you put her and her dad next to each other and they have very similar features.”</p><p>Kyle shrugs, “we talked about that, but I didn’t actually agree to it.”</p><p> </p>
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<a name="section0023"><h2>23. Book 3: Chapter 23</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <b>Legacies 23/?</b><br/>
</p><p> </p><p>Alex starts his morning off with a long visit with his doctor.</p><p>Talking through recovery and how his doctor feels he needs to be talking to a therapist at least a couple of times a week, next to him his mom is nodding along. Likely they’ve already discussed this without him present.</p><p>He’s actually surprised he’s not been greeted each morning by a therapist tapping on his door to talk through his feelings and memories.</p><p>“You will eventually remember some things,” the doctor says carefully, “but don’t be alarmed if you don’t remember everything.”</p><p>With his luck he’s going to remember all the things he <i>doesn’t</i> want to remember, like <i>everything</i> after his father appeared in the shed until he woke up in a hospital room with Michael next to him.</p><p>“I’d be okay with not remembering any of it,” he says softly, his mom squeezes his arm and he pulls his bottom lip between his teeth to keep from saying anything else.</p><p>It’s probably not <i>healthy</i> to not want those memories. But he can look in a mirror and see vividly what his dad did to him, he can look at Michael and see the marks that are fading on his skin and know that was done to him <i>because</i> of him.</p><p>The doctor just looks at him sadly but doesn’t give him the same ‘the brain is a funny thing’ speech that he’s gotten before.</p><p>The walk to the doctors office was one of his laps that morning so when they’re finally able to leave he wants nothing more then to go crawl back into his uncomfortable hospital bed and watch crappy daytime TV.</p><p>“Can we stop in and see Rosa?” he asks, because that’ll be a distraction at least. And he knows that Michael, Kyle and the others are going to school like normal that day. It’ll be hours before they’ll show up in his room and he can poke at Kyle about whatever is going on with Max and Liz.</p><p>“We can peek in and see if it’s ok,” his mom says and she takes the slow steps with him, he’s less achy and sore the more he moves around, probably why they wanted him doing laps in the hallway.</p><p>When they get to Rosa’s room the door is cracked and when Alex peeks his head in he can see Rosa sitting up and Kate sitting in a chair by the bed.</p><p>“Alex,” Rosa says and her voice is overly cheerful, the way it gets when she’s pretending to be happy. Alex can’t tell if it’s because of him or Kate, though the way her eyes shift to Kate and back to him he’s sure it’s because of Kate.</p><p>“I just wanted to see how you were… I can come back,” he offers.</p><p>Her eyes narrow at him and her expression screams ‘don’t you fucking leave this room hermano’.</p><p>“I can come back,” Kate says quietly, she’s in faded baggy sweats that Alex is confident she didn’t purchase herself. She’s also pale and quiet in a way that he would never have attributed to <i>any</i> of the Long’s, but especially not Kate who the handful times that he’s had to interact with her had always seemed vivacious and loud.</p><p>She pulls the door closed behind her when she leaves, and his mom must have gone off to bother nurses or find Rosa’s dad because she’s gone.</p><p>Alex arches a brow as he makes his way over to the chair that Kate vacated.</p><p>“Apologizing and thanking me for like the millionth time,” Rosa grumbles, she looks good with the exception of the marks around her neck that looks like someone tried to strangle her.</p><p>“Papa won’t let me put the shirts with high collars on,” Rosa says, fingers grazing the bruises, “but people also won’t stop looking at them which is frustrating.”</p><p>She looks at him, eyes studying him thoughtfully, “you probably can relate right now.”</p><p>“I’m going to be in therapy until I’m 90,” he says, “or highly medicated in some fashion… but I’m still alive so I’m finding it kind of hard to be mad about it.”</p><p>“I’d say fuck yeah for surviving, but my girlfriend is trying really hard to pretend she remembers me when it’s incredibly obvious to anyone with eyes and half a brain that she doesn’t,” Rosa sighs.</p><p>“Isobel Evans,” Alex taps his fingers against the arms of the chair.</p><p>“Like you told us anything about Michael Guerin,” Rosa arches an eyebrow at him and Alex shrugs in response.</p><p>Honestly, he’d thought Michael not interested in anything but a place to stay that wasn’t the bed of his truck. Alex hadn’t been prepared in the least for him to show up like he did in the museum and when Michael had said he wanted to talk to him he’d been mentally preparing himself for the ‘it’s not you, it’s me’ and ‘I like you but not like <i>that</i>’ and not at <i>all</i> prepared for Michael to kiss him.</p><p>“I like him,” Alex admits softly, “and I didn’t think he liked me back, not worth even mentioning at the time.”</p><p>“Wondered how you managed to hide the fact you were dating someone, was that day…” Rosa just stops and when Alex looks over at her he can see from the horrified expression on her face that she’s managed to piece together what Liz and Maria all distracted haven’t. “Oh cariño.”</p><p>“I’m trying to focus on the positives,” Alex says and Rosa nods at him like she understands. “You know, like Kyle and I are talking again, my mom is here and so is Greg… and Michael is my boyfriend,” he doesn’t think those words will ever get old.</p><p>Michael is his boyfriend.</p><p>“Focus on the positives,” Rosa says softly and there’s a wistful expression on her face.</p><p>“She spends time with you, that’s got to count for something, right?” Alex says.</p><p>“I guess, she was having these really bad migraines the last couple of weeks,” Rosa’s mouth twists and her voice is low like she doesn’t want to be overheard while sharing confidences. “I didn’t say anything but she passed out a couple of times, thought maybe she was taking something and didn’t want to tell me because I was trying to be clean; I looked through her bag and she didn’t have anything in there. Not even a joint or aspirin, just her wallet, her phone and nail polish remover.”</p><p>Alex opens his mouth and Rosa waves a hand at him.</p><p>“Just nail polish remover, I checked, no alcohol or anything.”</p><p>Alex leans forward and reaches out a hand, Rosa grabs onto it tightly and squeezes.</p><p>“So Kyle is your half-brother?” Alex asks and Rosa rolls her eyes at him but takes the subject change in stride.</p><p>“I’d kind of blocked out that if the Sheriff was actually my dad that meant that he was my half-brother,” Rosa sighs and Alex laughs at her annoyed expression.</p><p>“He’s actually trying.”</p><p>“Yeah, I know, been listening to Liz go on and on about him and Max Evans and whatever weird dance they’re doing. It’s getting really old and I can’t actually tell how she wants it to end.”</p><p> </p>
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</div><p> </p><p>At 2:45 Alex meanders down the hallway back to his room, school would have let out at 2:30 which means that if Michael comes directly from school they’ll likely meet at the door.</p><p>He’s sort of surprised to not see Michael either in the hallway or walking towards him though when he pushes the door open he can see that Michael is already in his room, in his usual chair bent over a notebook.</p><p>“Did school get out early?” he asks, he doesn’t remember there being any early dismissals until the days right before school is done for the semester.</p><p>“I have study halls for the last two periods so I asked if I could leave early to come here,” Michael says absently, then seems to realize that Alex is in the room standing in front of him. “Hi.”</p><p>“Hey,” Alex grins and Michael glances over at the closed door and the fact that no one followed Alex in and they are alone for probably a handful of minutes, drops his notebook and pen on the floor and stands.</p><p>His good hand cupping Alex’s cheek, the other resting against his hip and Alex puts his hands on Michael’s arms. Not gripping <i>too</i> tightly, just trying to keep him right there in front of him. Michael brushes his nose against cheek, peppering soft kisses in it’s wake and Alex closes his eyes and just breathes.</p><p>Michael smells different, the scent of the bodywash that Kyle has insisted on using for years clings to his skin. It’s unnerving a little bit.</p><p>Michael’s thumb brushes against his lower lip and Alex rests his forehead against Michael’s, when Michael kisses him it’s gentle and chaste and screams ‘we have all the time in the world’.</p><p>They stand there quietly, lips pressed together, breathing in sync with each other and Alex thinks that he doesn’t know what he would have done if his father had managed to tear this from him.</p><p>He’s seventeen, he knows love; he loves his mom, his brothers, Kyle and his mom and the Sheriff. Mimi and Maria; Liz and Rosa and Arturo… he’s even loved his father though his dad made that infinitely harder by never being able to accept that Alex is who he is.</p><p>He’s fairly confident that he can say that he’s never been <i>in</i> love; he’s had crushes and ill-fated infatuations.</p><p>What he feels for Michael almost equally terrifies him and exhilarates him, and the thought of losing it, of losing <i>Michael</i> it feels unfathomable.</p><p>“Hey you’re standing up,” he hears from the doorway and Michael makes a noise that sounds like a growl.</p><p>When Alex turns his head not letting go of Michael he can see Kyle standing in the doorway, backpack slung over his shoulder, Max visible right behind him.</p><p>Both of them grinning widely so Alex isn’t sure how long they’ve been standing there.</p><p> </p>
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<a name="section0024"><h2>24. Book 3: Chapter 24</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <b>Legacies 24</b><br/>
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<p>Alex is glad, though he doesn’t voice the sentiment, that he was unconscious when he was brought to the hospital. Though he also thinks that getting admitted probably doesn’t take half as long getting back out seems to.</p>
<p>It’s the doctor going over his instructions, then the nurse going over them again just in case they weren’t paying attention the first time.</p>
<p>His mom is looking annoyed, Alex is just thrilled to be leaving, though he might need a nap if it takes any longer.</p>
<p>He hadn’t expected to be going home but it still sort of blindsides him that he’s not going back to the house again, probably ever if his mom and the Sheriff and Mimi have any say in things.</p>
<p>His mom has rented a small two-bedroom house that Kyle’s mom and Mimi had helped her find, she’s looking for someplace more permanent.</p>
<p>The house is really close to Kyle’s house which he’s pretty sure is by design. So someone is always able to keep an eye on him.</p>
<p>He doesn’t really let out a breath of relief until he’s in the passenger seat of his mom’s car, waiting for the hospital staff to come running out insisting that they were wrong, he’s not ready to be discharged yet.</p>
<p>His mom carefully pulls the car away from the hospital and he can feel that weight lifting off, they’re not being called back, he’s free of those restrictions… now he’ll have other restrictions; like a curfew he’s sure though the benefits of sleeping in an <i>actual</i> bed instead of that hospital bed.</p>
<p>Learning how to live with his mom instead of his dad, there will be 100% less speeches about family honor and 50% more speeches questioning his dad’s sanity or lack thereof.</p>
<p>He closes his eyes and he didn’t think physically leaving the hospital would be so exhausting, but he somehow misses the entire drive and only blinks himself awake when his mom brushes his arm gently with one finger.</p>
<p>It was something they’d talked about with the first therapist before the doctor would sign off on the discharge.</p>
<p>No sudden movements, no raised voices.</p>
<p>Greg is standing right outside the door to a house that looks like a carbon copy of his dads except it’s a light blue instead of cream and the shutters are black instead of navy blue.</p>
<p>He hopes there’s no shed in the backyard, he doesn’t know if he could stomach it.</p>
<p>He blinks in surprise when he sees Flint, in uniform come out of the house. He looks exactly like he did the last time Alex had seen him, buzzed short hair, crisp uniform.</p>
<p>The lazy smirk is gone and there’s something that Alex doesn’t know how to read in his eyes when their mom steps out of the out car.</p>
<p>“You made good time,” his mom is saying as she pulls Flint into a tight hug while Greg opens his door, he stands back and lets Alex fumble at the seat belt and step out under his own power. He’s got on loose sweatpants and a t-shirt, he didn’t even bother asking where the clothes he’d been wearing that day are. He’s sure the answer is in an evidence bag somewhere or possibly the trash.</p>
<p>“Sheriff let us swing by the house and grab a few things from your room and the kitchen,” Greg says, he doesn’t touch him, just lets his hand hover around his elbow as Alex follows his mom and Flint to the front door.</p>
<p>The house is bright, curtains all wide-open letting sun light shine in and he can already see the little places where his mom has put her touch in just the few short days since she secured it.</p>
<p>There is nothing in the house that screams that his dad was here ever, he can feel the tension release just that little bit more at being in a safe place.</p>
<p>“We didn’t really do anything to your room,” Greg says showing him his space, the bed is already made with what looks like new sheets, there’s blinds on the window that are just cracked open. A dresser with a small TV sitting on it, a desk with a cheap looking roller chair pushed up to it.</p>
<p>“Where are you guys going to sleep?” Alex asks, he could have sworn his mom said that the house was only a two bedroom.</p>
<p>“There’s a small office that mom put a futon in,” Greg shrugs the nonchalant shrug of someone who has slept in worse conditions. “I’m going to sleep there, and Flint is only here for a couple of days so he’s going to take the couch.”</p>
<p>“That doesn’t really seem fair,” Alex says softly and Greg shrugs, reaches out to ruffle his hair with a gentle hand and a wry smirk curving his lips.</p>
<p>“Take a nap, Flint and I are going to argue about which of is going to man the grill and your ever growing group of friends is going to be here in a couple of hours with their assorted parental figures for a barbecue that mom is trying to convince herself is not in reality a housewarming party.”</p>
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<p>“Alex,” his mom’s voice is gentle and quiet and he blinks sleep away, there’s no clock in his room but he can still see daylight through the blinds.</p>
<p>He’d honestly not had any intention of sleeping, but the bed had looked soft and comfortable compared to the hospital beds he’s been sleeping in. So he’d thought to lay down, maybe doze and let his mind wander, not sleep but maybe just relish the quiet hum of Flint and Greg and his mom talking in the other room. Probably about him, more certainly about his dad.</p>
<p>“I’m awake,” he mumbles and his mom laughs softly, she’s standing near the door when he looks.</p>
<p>He stretches and sits up, swinging his legs off the side of the bed and standing, rubbing at his eyes.</p>
<p>She presses a hand to the side of his face, smiling at him before turning to go down the hallway, through the kitchen and out the backdoor into a backyard that he hadn’t noticed before.</p>
<p>There’s a picnic table that Michael and Max are sat at, Michael’s mom between them, across from Isobel has an older gentleman that Alex doesn’t recognize sitting next to her with Kyle next to her.</p>
<p>Liz’s dad and the Sheriff are by the grill, they don’t seem to be talking, both focused on the food in front of them.</p>
<p>“I think they think if they stay focused on conversations about food and drinks that they won’t ever have to talk about the fact that the Sheriff is <i>actually</i> Rosa’s dad,” Liz hooks her hand around his arm and leans a bit into his side.</p>
<p>“At least she’s not a kid, there won’t be any awful fights about who she should be living with?” Alex says and Liz sighs.</p>
<p>“Especially since my mom took off, not even here to answer for herself,” Liz says bitterly, “At least Kyle’s mom isn’t being openly hostile about it anymore.”</p>
<p>Alex doesn’t say anything to that, after his mom had left Kyle’s mom had been the only mom that he’d been able to go to and she wasn’t even his.</p>
<p>Michael notices him standing there, face breaking out into a big smile at seeing him there and Alex thinks the only reason he doesn’t get up is because his mom is sitting there with her arm around his back.</p>
<p>“We going to talk about the Kyle and Max thing?” Alex asks and Liz rolls her eyes.</p>
<p>“There’s nothing to talk about,” Liz says.</p>
<p>“Sure,” Alex nods and Liz tugs him in the direction of the picnic table. Michael grins up at him as Alex steps up close to him, he pulls on the elastic band of Alex’s sweatpants and tugs him close. Smile widening even more as Alex leans into his side, resting an arm over his shoulder.</p>
<p>The older man sitting next to Isobel looks at him, there’s a hint of <i>something</i> about him that Alex recognizes though he <i>know</i> he doesn’t know him.</p>
<p>“We were just talking about what plans everyone has for after school,” the man, that Alex is sure is the David that Michael and Max have mentioned in passing, says. His voice has the same lyrical quality to it that Michael’s mom has.</p>
<p>“College, great American novel, college, not school, college,” Michael jerks his head around the table and Alex arches a brow at Kyle’s very faked shrug of indifference.</p>
<p>“I’m undecided but it’ll probably end up being pre-med,” he says and Alex remembers a long ago conversation where Kyle admitted to wanting to be a doctor of some sort and really didn’t want to go into law enforcement like both his parents.</p>
<p>“You know rodeo clown is still a valid life choice,” Alex says and Kyle huffs a laugh.</p>
<p>“Not if I don’t want to be living with my folks when I’m 30 because I’m worn down and broken.”</p>
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<p>“You never said what you’re going to do after graduation,” Michael says, they’re curled up together in the bed of Michael’s truck. Michael doesn’t live out of it, not with Kyle’s mom making sure he’s at the house each night, but he still keeps a couple of blankets behind the seats.</p>
<p>“Not school with you guys, at least not in the fall, I’ll probably start in January,” Alex says, he brushes his thumb across Michael’s lips.</p>
<p>“You could still come with us, I think Kyle’s mom is trying to get us to rent an apartment instead of staying on campus.”</p>
<p>“You know Max would be all over that, you should probably ask him,” Alex says, he shivers a little when Michael’s fingers push up under his t-shirt, dragging against his skin lightly.</p>
<p>“He asked Liz to go on this big road trip thing he wants to do,” Michael’s nose wrinkles and Alex leans forward to nuzzle against his cheek.  “She said no, wants to stay here with Rosa and her dad before she leaves to go to Colorado so he asked Kyle if he wanted to go.”</p>
<p>Alex already knows this, he knows this because Kyle had called to ask him the night before if it was the wrong decision, if he should have said no like Liz did and spent the summer packing and repacking for school and worrying about flunking out.</p>
<p>“Maybe it’ll be good for them,” Alex offers, he’s not sure if Kyle is even open to the option of something besides a friendship with Max.</p>
<p>But he at least doesn’t seem to be openly rebuffing Max’s very vague overtures of whatever.</p>
<p>“I don’t think Max even knows what the hell he wants,” Michael mutters, Alex kisses his cheek and Michael pulls him just a bit tighter against him. “Let’s not talk about Valenti and Max anymore.”</p>
<p>Alex grins, pulls back a bit so he can look at him, can cup a hand around his cheek. When Michael presses his other hand against the back of his head and draws him close to kiss.</p>
<p>Someday they’ll have privacy like they did on that day where it went all horribly wrong, where they can lay skin to skin in a bed they call their own. Where Alex can press Michael down on the mattress, or Michael can press him.</p>
<p>Where they can spend hours upon hours touching each other, kissing, making plans for the future that don’t involve one or the other of them hiding who they are.</p>
<p>But for now, with Michael’s lips warm against his… he thinks this is enough.</p>
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  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Yes, you are reading that correctly. I'm marking Legacies as complete... for now. I haven't decided if I'll update Legacies when I'm ready for Book 4 or if Kyle, Max and Liz will get their own story. But for now, it's done and I'm off to work on the time travel fic and the prequel to Unseen Flight. :) Time travel fic (Lost To Time) will start posting in this spot next week.</p>
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